Music of the Night
by Radioactive88
Summary: Kol Mikaelson is not the domestic type. Seduce, murder, move on. But one day, in Victorian London, he meets a lowly French prostitute, Ella, with the voice of an angel, and her blind baby sister, Claire. According to Kol, love doesn't exist, and family is full of betrayals. But what if they prove him wrong? And if it's wrong, then he maybe doesn't want it to be right.
1. Sing to Me

**A/N: Okay, this is only Goldie here, of our writing duo. I really should not be doing this, but I can't help it, because it's been itching at my brain for months upon months. A Kol x OC romance. I know, I know, a lot of them have already been done, but I don't think I'm being too cliche in saying that mine will be different.**

 **For one, it has a heavy "Phantom of the Opera" influence, with a little "Les Mis" sprinkled in there. It takes place in Victorian London, and then France, and the OC will have a little sister who may end up with a different Mikaelson brother.**

 **I'm not sure what else to say, yet, except that the main OC is a prostitute, but it will become evident why she is one, at age sixteen. Please read, review, and enjoy! Thanks so much :).**

 **Warnings: Mild sex scene, virtually no graphic description. Murder at the end, because it's Kol and Kol likes killing people. Oh, and I'm terribly sorry if I butchered the lovely French language. I'm taking French classes in my high school, but still, some of it is courtesy of google translate.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing but my OCs.**

 **Chapter 1: Sing to Me**

 **Ella's Perspective**

I started selling my body when I was thirteen. It hurt, at first, and I would cry the entire time, but it never bothered the men I was with. Why would it? If they had a shred of decency, they wouldn't be having sex with a vulnerable young girl for a pocketful of francs.

It was for my sister. Everything was for my petite soeur. She was my world, and I was hers.

Which is why, only three years later, a greasy, unattractive man was rocking on top of me. He moaned my name in my ear, his hands gripping fistfuls of my hair, and I found myself staring at the painfully slow hands of his old grandfather clock. When I was younger, whoring myself out made me feel pathetic and as low as dirt. Now? I couldn't feel a damned thing.

I faked a few cries here and there, then stifled a sigh of relief as he rolled off me, panting and grinning away. It was good - for _him_. By now, I was an expert in this field of work. "That was brilliant," he gasped as I reached for my discarded dress. "You deserved that money, sweetheart."

 _I'm not your sweetheart_ , I wanted to scream, but it was no use. They were all the same. I fished my well-earned wad of pounds off his nightstand and struggled to pull my shoes on. "You're leaving?"

I sighed as I flung my bag over my shoulder, hardly sparing the man a glance. "My job is done, monsieur." My shoulders were as heavy as ever with the weight of what I was forced to endure. For her, I reminded myself. I had to do this for my soeur. But every day, it became more and more difficult not to resent that. To resent her.

I locked that thought out of my mind as I stepped outside into the icy, winter London air, my short heels crunching against the thin layer of snow. No, I _refused_ to stray down that path. I wasn't going to turn into my mère. My soeur was the only light in my life, my little golden star. She was the single only reason my heart still beat.

I wanted to weep as I had my rare, precious alone time, but my eyes were as dry as sand in the freezing wind. Now, I was a machine, acting out the motions and slowly killing myself in the process. But I still managed to plaster on a smile for my petite soeur. Because she would not feel unwanted or rejected for a damned second.

London wasn't bad, I suppose, but I missed Paris. After my mère abandoned us, we moved in with my _tante_ in the thick of London, who just so _happened_ to run a brothel. Then my aunt died, and I was still entangled in the life.

The nearest food stand was still open, and I used my paycheck to buy a loaf of bread along with a few apples, a block of cheese, and a full can of beans. That was all I could afford for now, but it would have to do. The meat was too expensive. One day, I would give my petite soeur everything her heart desired, but today was not that day.

After stuffing the food into my bag, I sucked in a sharp sigh at the old, abandoned church in the distance that we had taken illegal residence in. Living there and doing what I did for a living felt so _sacrilegious_. But, at this point in my life, I wasn't so sure if there was a God watching over me or not. If there was, then He didn't give a damn about me.

The short, fuzzy hair on the back of my neck bristled and I paused in my steps. Somebody was watching me. Somebody . . . bad. Remaining as still as I could, I looked around me in every possible direction, but only saw the filthy streets and puddles of rainwater and piss that surrounded this area of town. Perhaps it was nothing, but my instincts were rarely wrong.

Still, I hurried to the church, where my petite soeur waited for me, alone and vulnerable. It was not a safe time to be wandering about in this area of London. The night sky loomed over me like a blanket, and for once, faint stars were visible through wisps of leftover storm clouds. My heart pounded beneath my ribs, and the weight on my shoulders lessened only slightly as I slipped into the secret back entrance of the church.

A large, indulgent smile spread across my weary features as I observed my petite soeur from the shadows. Obediently, like I told her, she stayed near the altar, where our meager possessions were scattered about. She sat at the church's old piano bench and humming to herself, drummed her fingers over the keys. The little girl never had any lessons or music sheets, but she had a raw talent and a natural ear, which made her playing nonsensical yet pleasant.

My petite soeur was blind. She was only three years old with faulty vision when I escaped with her from my "family," and lost her sight to a sheet of cataracts not two years after. She was six years old now, compared to my sixteen.

Her light, almost white blonde hair gleamed softly in the dull lighting, like an individual beam of moonlight. As she glided her fingers over the keys, her little tongue poked against the corner of her lip, a sign of her fierce concentration. In her once stunning blue eyes, it was as if milk was poured inside of her irises, covering most of the blue with its white surface. It was unsettling at first, but once I grew used to it, it made no difference to me.

"Ella?" she said, not budging from the piano bench. After losing her sight, her other senses sharpened and fine-tuned themselves, so she could always hear me before I even spoke.

"Claire," I replied happily, tossing my sack of food to the side to envelope her into a warm, sisterly embrace, which she gladly returned. "You get better and better at playing every day."

A tiny smirk touched her lips. "You _have_ to say that, you're ma grande soeur." Still, using the stick I found her in the gutter as a makeshift cane, she found her way to the food by fragrance alone. "May I have some bread, Ella?" Even as she was asking, she was tearing off one of the ends and shoving it into her mouth. "Better to ask for forgiveness than permission," she said through the mouthful of food. She learned that from our late aunt at some point or another.

Even though I was as hungry as her, I stood near the altar of the church, and looked upon the rows and rows of dusty, cobwebbed benches. It was once a grand area, that much I knew, but time and forgetfulness had taken its toll. How powerful it must feel to stand in front of people and shape their minds however you wanted to . . . to speak and be listened to, because they believe your words are the truths they have been seeking. . . .

I jumped as a high musical note rang through the air. Claire had returned to her piano bench, ready to play. "Sing, Ella," she murmured. "Do _Amazing Grace_ , so I can play along."

It was a song I'd crooned to my petite soeur enough times that she managed to craft a rough melody for it, all by ear. Her lullaby. Smiling, I nodded in affirmation and faced the empty rows. "People of London!" She giggled from where she sat, and I continued, "I have come to perform for you, so listen closely, parce que je commencerai!" _*because I will begin!_ *

So, I opened my mouth, and sang.

"Amazing grace! How sweet the sound

That saved a wretch like me!

I once was lost, but now am found;

Was blind, but now I see."

Sucking in a breath, and looked over at my blind sister, who sometimes, I swore could see better than anyone what was true and what was false. Her skinny little fingers created a melody that swam around me, a sea of colors and wonder invisible to the naked eye, but so real it was as if I could reach out and touch the tangible beauty.

Little Claire repeated the same verses and offered me a cue to continue, which I gratefully accepted.

"'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,

And grace my fears relieved;

How precious did that grace appear

The hour I first believed.

Through many dangers, toils and snares,

I have already come;

'Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,

And grace will lead me home."

For the briefest of moments, a sixth sense spiked within me, as if somebody was watching me. Watching the insignificant French whore sing about concepts much purer than she could ever begin to comprehend, about a grace she wasn't sure existed. But it mattered not, for when I sang, I was free, and as long as the floating music wound me up into its loving embrace, nobody could take that freedom away from me.

"The Lord has promised good to me,

His Word my hope secures;

He will my Shield and Portion be,

As long as life endures."

A Lord I didn't know if I believed in. No good was promised to me, nor any manner of protection against the harsh realities of the world. My soul was tainted and blackened as I sinned my way through life, and if the Lord was real, then He did not love me as He loved his other creations. If no higher power cared about me, and I could no longer be saved, then all the grace in the universe I would craft into a Shield for Claire, because if she was a blind spot in the Lord's eternal eye, then I would protect her instead. _That_ is what such grace meant to me.

"Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail,

And mortal life shall cease,

I shall possess, within the veil,

A life of joy and peace.

The earth shall soon dissolve like snow,

The sun forbear to shine;

But God, who called me here below,

Will be forever mine.

When we've been there ten thousand years,

Bright shining as the sun,

We've no less days to sing God's praise

Than when we'd first begun."

As the final note cascaded from my mouth, a single tear rolled down my cheek, dropping onto the dusty floorboards to never be seen again. It was as if my heart and spirit was put on display for the world, and in that moment, I'd never felt so vulnerable.

I numbly walked to one of the nearest benches and sat down, hating myself for the sobs that racked my entire body. Someone like me did not deserve to sing a poem so lovely and beautiful, as if I had any right to claim the lyrics and apply them to myself.

I was a whore. A dirty, filthy whore whose only purpose in life was to spread open her legs for greedy men with greedy eyes and greedy hands and greedy souls. . . . A stain on the fabric of everything good and holy.

A gentle touch glided over my hand, and Claire sat quietly beside me, choosing then to lean her head against my shoulder. She was the one entity I'd done right by in my life, and thus, she was my saving grace. "Je suis là, et je t'aime," she murmured, and weeping silently, I cradled her slender form to my chest, thanking every deity I did not believe in that she was here with me today. _*I am here, and I love you.*_

Something prickled into my skin, like rays of harsh sunlight, and I looked up. For the quickest of seconds, I met the brown-eyed, unfathomably intense gaze of a man who was standing still as a stone in the back entrance. In a flash of intuition, I knew that he was not there for benevolent purposes, but he did not move. His fierce stare bore straight into me, as if he could see past all of my walls right into my soul, but I was not afraid. Somehow, I knew he was dangerous and perhaps even deadly, but I could not find it in me to fear him.

Then I blinked, and he was gone.

* * *

 **Kol's Perspective**

It wasn't the first time Kol had a serial killer persona crafted for him, as silly little humans scrambled to find answers to their unimportant questions. But "Jack the Ripper" was painfully uncreative, in his opinion. For one, did he even _look_ like a Jack?

And what was that rubbish about the anonymous murderer donning himself in shabby, inconspicuous clothing? Kol Mikaelson might have been a psychotic maniac, but nobody could say he wasn't a stickler for good fashion.

Elijah would surely trace it back to him. Kill one or two or twenty prostitutes for fun (the stupid humans only noticed five), maybe get a little colorful with it, and _bam_ , it had to be Kol. It was offensive and incredibly uncalled for. Sure, Kol _was_ the murderer, but Elijah didn't need to assume the worst even if the worst was true.

Always and forever _indeed_.

Around seventy years ago, give or take, his bastard brother plucked a dagger out of his heart because he got bored, and Kol awakened only to see that Niklaus had apparently accepted a dull little boy into the Mikaelson midst that all of them already loved more than Kol. So, he escaped by the skin of his teeth, before he could wind up in a coffin again.

He enjoyed his freedom, and also enjoyed the fact that he hadn't interacted with any of his rotten siblings for decades. Well, he enjoyed it for the most part. Sometimes he missed Nik's penchant for glorious murder, and teasing Bekah since she was so delightfully easy to rile up, and even Elijah's mind-numbingly stale lectures that Kol disobeyed the next day.

Oh, bother, he would find them again in the next century. Maybe gift them with a souvenir or two. Or not, depending on his mood.

Whistling to himself, he strutted along the gloomy streets of London as fog swirled around him. It had been a good day. Sex, a lovely breakfast made of French pastries, sex, heavy midday drinking, sex, a ravishing view of the city while he ate a magnificent dinner of lamb chops and blood, sex, and a nice, old-fashioned murder spree. A bit of a slow day, but a pleasant one nonetheless.

Now, all he had to do was find a sharp-tongued little snack for dessert, and he would have a nice end to a nice day. He couldn't understand why those little humans lived in such slums. Conditions weren't so obviously desolate before industrialization, although the Black Death seemed to kill off a lot of them and all those various useless wars in their desperate struggle for power. But they did not know true power, not like Kol did. They could never understand.

A large, predatory smile spread across Kol's face as his eyes landed on his next victim. Oh, this was a pretty one. Just the way he liked them. Long, wild curls of fiery red hair, glowing embers in the moonlight, to accompany pale, almost translucent skin. Her dress was shorter than most, tight, and revealing; she must've been a whore. She and Bekah had a lot in common, then. It was also perfect, because he could continue on his _Jack the Ripper_ streak.

Ah, he could hear the blood pounding from her heart, see it beneath that paper-thin skin. She knew something was wrong, and her pace slowed to a stop. This was it, the perfect opportunity to whoosh in, and rip into the girl's throat.

And then she turned around, and he paused for the slightest of moments. Her eyes were the most vibrant, piercing, aggressive shade of blue he'd ever before seen. As if men would fall to her feet on the dozen and she could slaughter them all with nothing but a glance their way. Her eyes were two sharpened sapphire blades, and for a split second, Kol could have sworn she noticed him as the weapons pierced his torso.

He blinked, and then she was hurrying over to an abandoned building of sorts - it was a church that must've been left alone for decades. Her hair bounced behind her in a tangled waterfall of fire - holy hell, a _waterfall of fire_? It was bloody hair. The bloody hair of his dessert for the night, not some poetic rubbish. Disgusting; it sounded like a phrase Nik would vomit up in one of his love sonnets. In fact, Kol was almost certain his brother had used the exact same words to describe Aurora de Martel's hair once. _Ugh_.

Ridding his head of all horrendously stupid thoughts, he followed her to the back of the church, quick as a flash but silent as a shadow. He smiled again at the thought of sinking his fangs into her delicate neck, and hearing her scream into the cold, empty night. His mouth watered at the mere thought of it.

The girl entered the back of the church, and he nearly slipped in after to finish her off when he saw another human inside. A miniature human, who fumbled along the keys of a piano. His brow furrowed. It was a soft, sweet melody, and it reminded him of when Elijah used to play, although Elijah was much, much better with centuries of practice.

Kol was about to make a lunge for the red-haired girl when the miniature human turned around, and surprised him. Her irises were almost as white as the area surrounding them, and her pupils were near nonexistent. The child was blind. "Ella?" she asked as the red-haired girl rushed forward.

"Claire!" The two girls embraced and Kol suppressed a groan; he didn't particularly fancy killing children, so somehow, he would have to lure out the redhead when she was not fussing over the miniature human. "You get better and better at playing every day."

Humph. Then the bar must've been set _very_ low. But there was a small, strange detail about the both of them that Kol easily observed; they both had thick French accents, as if they'd just arrived from the heart of Paris.

Rolling his eyes, Kol tuned the girls out as they conversed with one another, waiting for an opportunity to strike. He frowned in confusion when the smaller human returned to the piano seat and the older one stood in front of the rows of empty benches. The miniature human said something that Kol dutifully ignored; he was too hyper-focused on his prey.

"People of London!" the red-haired girl cried out into nothing, her skinny shoulders heaving as she spoke louder. "I have come to perform for you, so listen closely, parce que je commencerai!" She slipped into French at the end, but Kol had a decent grasp of the language, so he roughly understood what she said.

Fine, he would brutally murder her _after_ she did whatever she was planning to do. Inconveniencing Kol, to be specific. Then, she started to sing, and he found himself frozen stiff in the back doorway, unable to move nor avert his eyes from the girl.

"Amazing grace! How sweet the sound

That saved a wretch like me!

I once was lost, but now am found;

Was blind, but now I see."

The unseeing little human kept playing along with a remarkable surety and grace, but the red-haired girl stopped singing, and Kol almost found himself yelling for her to continue, before he caught and ridiculed himself for the near lapse in judgement and control. _Stop being a twat and kill her already, you could already be on to your next victim by now!_

And yet, something about her sweet vocals compelled him to stay in perfect stillness.

"'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,

And grace my fears relieved;

How precious did that grace appear

The hour I first believed.

Through many dangers, toils and snares,

I have already come;

'Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,

And grace will lead me home."

Her lilting, angelic voice struck a chord in him that had been long hidden for centuries, a part of him he assumed had long rotted away into darkness. The high soprano soared through the church and beyond, filling the grim London skies with strokes of bright, colorful wildness.

Kol swallowed hard as she continued to sing, and allowed himself to close his eyes, and immerse himself into the music. He bathed in the melody as if it were made of liquid stars.

Oh bloody hell, he had to leave before he thought anything else unbearably sappy and repulsive. He needed to break his own neck to snap him out of his pathetic stupor. In fact, he would've _welcomed_ a dagger in his heart, courtesy of Nik, if only to free himself.

But . . . he did not move.

"The Lord has promised good to me,

His Word my hope secures;

He will my Shield and Portion be,

As long as life endures.

Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail,

And mortal life shall cease,

I shall possess, within the veil,

A life of joy and peace.

The earth shall soon dissolve like snow,

The sun forbear to shine;

But God, who called me here below,

Will be forever mine.

When we've been there ten thousand years,

Bright shining as the sun,

We've no less days to sing God's praise

Than when we'd first begun."

Something deep within the shriveled, blackened cockles of Kol's cold, dead heart ached when he realized the song was over. And when the red-haired girl began to cry, he found himself actually _understanding_. Normally, he would have chocked up the silly human emotion to the all-around weakness of the lesser species, but after hearing the raw feelings she poured into each and every word, he understood.

 _The day you empathize with a human is the day you are truly lost_. Kol had reminded himself of that for centuries, so he convinced himself that no, he did not feel _empathy_ for the red-haired girl, but merely comprehended the logic behind her meltdown. _Oh, fuck me_.

The red-haired girl lowered herself onto one of the grimy benches, and for the first time, he garnered a decent look at her face. Despite its blotchy redness from her relentless tears, she was quite attractive with sharp, almost elvish features and an endearing splash of freckles on her nose and cheeks.

 _Kol, snap out of it! You did not just use the word "endearing" unironically in an actual sentence_. Still, Kol observed closely as the blonde, almost white-haired miniature human climbed up beside the red-haired girl and displayed sisterly physical affection. Upon seeing both of their faces, they _had_ to be sisters, despite the contrast of pigments.

"Je suis là," the miniature human whispered, so quietly Kol almost had to strain to hear it, "et je t'aime." * _I am here, and_ _I love you_.* This is what family was _supposed_ to look like, not the hateful, dysfunctional mess he left behind in New Orleans. In fact, all they ever did was exclude him from their ridiculous vow, so the lot of them barely constituted as his family at all.

Kol stiffened when the red-haired girl looked up at him with tearful, red-rimmed, vehemently blue eyes. _Well, you have to kill her_ now _, you idiot_. But, for some reason, he found himself wanting to leave her alive. Only because removing that voice from this earth would be a tragedy, and Kol was cruel and ruthless, but perhaps the tiniest sliver of mercy was in order when he _had_ enjoyed himself.

The red-haired girl, Ella, did not avert her steady gaze. It was as if she was waiting for him to make a move, waiting him to fulfill the malicious purpose behind the true reason he was standing behind the back doorway. Kol was the predator, and she was the prey.

Detesting himself for it, Kol merely removed himself from the situation, running as fast as he could from the horrid slums of the city, away from the church, away from her enchanting voice, away from _her_.

Had he gone _soft_? No, he was Kol bloody Mikaelson, the wildest vampire of all time. Not that he needed to _prove_ himself, but he found himself cornering a drunken happy couple into an alley, smirking as wickedly as he pleased. "Darlings, this is _not_ your lucky night."

But still, even as he murdered them, even as he _ripped_ them limb from limb, even as he drained every single drop of blood from their mutilated corpses, that voice still crooned its haunting melody in his ears.

 **A/N: So, Originals/TVD fam? What'd ya think? Like it, love it, hate it? How do you feel about the concept, and how do you think Kol will find the sisters again? Please review, I love feedback! :D**


	2. Dear Sister

**A/N: Ahhhhhhh, I love all of you! Thank you so much for reading, reviewing, favoriting, and following this story! You guys are the most gourmet kind of awesome sauce there is. Seriously, go find all the cookies in your house and eat them, because you deserve that sugary goodness.**

 **I both had fun and struggled to write this chapter. I struggled to write the sexual scenes with Ella, since it hurt me to hurt her, but I loved writing the interactions between Kol and Claire. Claire will have her first perspective next chapter.**

 **Warning: Abuse of a sexual nature in the first section with Ella and her client.**

 **Please read, review, and enjoy! Thank you so much! :D Oh, and I apologize for yet again potentially butchering the alluring French language.**

 **Chapter 2: Dear Sister**

 **Ella's Perspective**

My heart thundered like a wild stallion in my chest as the man led me to his dwelling, a house fancier and more opulent than I'd ever before seen. It made sense; he had one of the poshest voices I'd ever _heard_. "Come along, whore," he said, leering over his shoulder at me as if I were nothing more than a slab of raw meat. "My wife isn't home."

I fought the tempting urge to roll my eyes. Of course he had a wife; most of my clients did. They looked down at me from their lofty throne, spitting at my feet, yet most of them were scoundrels and cheats. But, since it was still my living, I plastered on a sultry smile and purred, "What a naughty boy."

He led me shamelessly through the back entrance of his mansion, and bile rose into my throat at the cabinets lined with pictures of his wife, sons, and daughters. And _I_ was the scum of the earth, the dirt beneath a higher class man's shoe. As I was busy scrutinizing the photographs, the man's hand landed sharply onto my backside, and I yelped, before covering up my negative reaction with a well-practiced smirk. "Ah, perhaps _I_ am the naughty one, non?"

There was something truly sinister about his answering grin. "Mmm, that you are." So, he would be _that_ kind of client. Very well, I'd handled similar cases with enough class and dignity to receive a full paycheck with generous tips. "Go find my bedroom, sweets, and wait for me. I expect your clothes to be off." With another equally painful smack on the behind, he propelled me toward the grand spiral staircase, and I obeyed his clear instructions.

On the way to the master bedroom, I peeked into what had to be one of his daughters' rooms, and grimaced at the sight of frilly dolls and other childish playthings. She was a little girl, and had no idea about the knife her father was twisting into her back. It was disgusting, and unable to think about it any longer, I shut the door with a soft _click_ , and continued on my quest.

The master bedroom was grand and stately, and I felt supremely out of place in it. There was a luxurious canopy bed and smooth, oak furniture, along with a heinous amount of knick knacks.

Ignoring the ring of fear that it brought every time, I shimmied out of my dress and undergarments, allowing them to pool at my ankles. Kicking off my shoes, I climbed onto the magnificent, mahogany blankets of his bed, and waited on baited breath for him to arrive. _It'll be over soon, and then you can go back to Claire_.

My heart all but stopped in my chest when he entered the room, armed with chains, a gag, and a whip of sorts. "Merde," I breathed. _*Shit_.*

"On all fours, and turn around, slut," the man ordered, and reluctantly, I positioned myself onto my hands and knees, my bare ass on prominent display for him. I hated how incredibly vulnerable I felt, for good reason.

The first lash that connected with my backside _cracked_ through the room, then left a trail of fire in its wake. With much difficulty, I forced a whimper back down my throat. _Be still, be quiet, and it'll be over soon_. Two, three, four, five . . . each leaving an angry red mark that I'd likely carry for weeks. _Be strong._

He then focused the whip on my tender thighs, and I couldn't help but cry out a few times. "That's it, tramp, just like that," the man groaned, and the sound of him pleasuring himself was almost as loud as the whip itself.

"Oui, monsieur," I hissed through ground teeth, reverting back to my native tongue in times of turmoil. The man then focused his attention elsewhere, snapping the whip onto my back, my shoulders, my stomach, even my breasts. He was a sadist, plain and simple. _This is for your petite soeur, this is for your sister . . ._

Blood was trickling down my body along with silent tears down my face when he flipped me over, making quick work in chaining my hands to the sleek, wooden head of the bed, and splaying my legs apart, restraining each ankle to an opposite bedpost. I bit down on my lip as hard as I could to keep from bursting into noisy sobs.

It made no difference, in the end, since he stuffed the gag into my mouth. I choked on the foul, rancid fabric that must've been used on dozens of other prostitutes. I wondered if I knew any of them.

Once his clothes were removed, he did not wait another second before violently fondling my exposed chest, then shoving himself within me. I coughed and whimpered against the gag as he ravaged my aching body. During the agonizing intercourse, he periodically slapped me across the face, as to increase his deranged sexual pleasure. It took all my willpower not to break into two.

When he pulled out and finished on the bedsheets, we did not talk. After he unchained me, I pulled on my dress over the welts and slashes he inflicted upon me, brushing away the last of my tears. Quietly, without any fuss, he handed me my paycheck, and it was a considerable amount more than I expected.

It was worth it. It had to be. Everything was for her, for Claire. I had to ensure she survived, I _had_ to, because I loved her more than life itself. Even if I allowed life to rip me to shreds in her name.

I left through the backdoor, and that was that.

* * *

 **Kol's Perspective**

The damn witch was thirty minutes late to their lunch meeting, and Kol was growing impatient. Her so-called dark object was becoming less and less appealing, considering he could easily acquire something superior.

Sure, he'd shagged her a few times, and she was an acceptable lay, but her presence was irritating and her use dwindling. Perhaps he would drain her instead, so he could have a halfway decent day.

"I'm so sorry, Mr. Mikaelson," the petite brunette squeaked, a healthy amount of cleavage bouncing around as she hurried to his table. Her blue eyes were wide with contrition and lust, and Kol found himself contemplating that her eyes were nowhere near as azure as the red-haired singer from the night before. Not that he was _thinking_ about her, or anything of the sort; it was merely a passing observation.

"You're late," Kol said coldly, downing the last of his bourbon, relishing in the burn that trailed fire down his throat. "I'm a very busy man, Miss Lisa Blake. I do not like to be kept waiting. Now, before you waste any more of my time, show me the bloody artifact."

Her features twisting with obvious hurt that didn't affect him in the slightest, she pulled out the aforementioned object from her purse to put on display, and he rolled his eyes to the filthy pub ceiling. The pesky little witch brought him in for _this_? He could find a worthier magical item on the suspicious stand on the nearest street corner selling spices and disguised opium. "Unfortunately, darling, that isn't enough for me." Her lower lip began to wobble. "But you _can_ be of some use to me."

Her smile brightened hopefully. "Oh yes, anything -"

Kol didn't let her finish before he lunged over the table and sank his elongated fangs into her jugular. Her startled shrieks amused him as the heavenly liquid gushed down his throat. He was none too gentle about it, either.

Before too long, her heartbeat ceased and her body slumped against the table, where he decided to leave her. Luckily for him, there were only other a few patrons and the bartender, who all gawked at him. Now, Elijah would scold him to simply compel them and move on his merry way, but Kol wasn't that type of vampire.

After slaughtering them all, and disposing of their mutilated corpses in the cellar, he strolled down the sidewalk, much happier than before. He garnered a few odd looks for the few droplets of blood that had dripped down his chin onto his dress shirt, but he hardly stopped to answer questions, and he wiped most of it away anyway.

Kol wasn't paying any particular attention to where he was headed, since his schedule for the rest of the day was abruptly cleared, as his witchy client was now rotting near vintage bottles of brew. Oh, well. Things happened, and he had to roll with the punches.

Kol frowned to himself when he realized where he ended up. The old, abandoned church from the day before. Why the bloody hell was he _here_ , of all places, in the armpit of civilization? . . . Damn it to hell, he picked up that phrase from Elijah.

Well, he reasoned, he might as well find out if the red-haired girl was in there or not, since he'd come all this way. Straining his ears, he did not hear any suggestion of music being played inside, so he turned to go, when -

Children. _Children_? He loathed children, abhorred their very existence. But a high-pitched cry for help rang from the church, and it sounded eerily similar to the miniature human who'd been accompanying the red-haired girl on piano.

 _I should leave._ There was nothing interesting in there for him. But then again, he had nothing _better_ to do. And the miniature human had been a talented little pianist with boundless potential in the art, if guided more properly. Since _theoretically_ the two girls did Kol a favor with their music, he _supposed_ he might as well find out what all the commotion was about.

Since nobody owned the church, it was all too easy to barge through the front doors; he adored his dramatic entrances. But much to his disdain, none of the children even _noticed_ him. _Puny peasants_. It was a strange sight. A horde of five to ten young boys, ages Kol could not decipher nor give a single fuck about, surrounded the miniature human from the night before. She cowered beneath them, and Kol simply watched, curious to see what would occur.

"Leave me alone," the miniature human whispered, her head snapping this way and that as she tried to focus on where the imminent threat was through sound alone.

"I _knew_ somethin' was hidin' in here!" one of the gremlins shouted, triumphant, landing a hard kick on the blind human's ribcage. She released a sharp cry of pain. Kol frowned again. This was hardly a fair fight. "You said it was a ghost, Johnny, but it's just some stupid little kid."

"Maybe she is a ghost," another of them reasoned. "All I hear all goddamn day is some piano shite. Maybe she's hauntin' the place." _Oh, please_. Reasonably pleasant music did not constitute "haunting." Kol was an expert in the field of _haunting_ ; he could show them a trick or two.

"Or a ghoul!" a bigger boy chimed in, thumbing the straps of his overalls. "Look at her _eyes_. She's a freak. We oughta teach her a lesson, drive the freak outta the neighborhood. We'd be heroes!" In correspondence to his words, he grabbed her by the scruff of her ill-fitted raggedy dress, and tossed her into the aisle, where she landed with a hard _thud_.

Tears silently streamed down her cheeks, and she yelled, "I've done nothing to you!"

Something dark and feral stirred inside of Kol, as if he wanted to _protect_ the miniature human. There was something about her innocent little face that reminded him of his long dead baby brother, Henrik, whom he protected from any and all threats. But not the wolves. Not the damn wolves.

And here, the boys circled her like a pack of wild wolves. One picked up a stick, and waved it around as if it were some sort of trophy. "Look-y here, it's her seein' eye stick!" In one swift movement, he swung it against her chin, and blood spurted from a gash in her soft pink lips. He then taunted, "Didn't see _that_ , didya?" After that, he snapped it over his knee, and tossed the splintered pieces aside, rendering it useless.

The boys swarmed in on her, punching, kicking, hair-pulling, scratching, spitting . . . And yet, the miniature human fought back. She held up tightly coiled fists and attacked in the direction she assumed the assaults were coming from, her face screwed up in the utmost concentration. She wound up mostly hitting empty air, but _damn_ if that little thing didn't try.

Kol decided to put an end to the whole affair, which worked famously when he reached for the oldest boy, a gangly teenager, and launched him into the air to crash straight through the front doors into the filth outside. The impact was enough to potentially kill him. "You lot like picking on people smaller and weaker than you?" he bellowed, allowing black veins to grow beneath his eyes and for his fangs to sharpen, igniting expressions of sheer terror. "Spoiler alert: so do I."

It was a brief spot of fun to chase the little goblins in every imaginable direction, offering threats of murder and dismemberment. Once the last boy fled the premises, he felt a tugging on his pants, and looked down to see the miniature human standing right beside him, unseeing eyes still swimming with tears. "Merci, monsieur, merci," she murmured, throwing her arms around his waist. _*Thank you, sir, thank you.*_

Kol's arms shot straight in the air as the miniature human actually _hugged_ him. "De rien," he muttered, shifting awkwardly from foot to foot. * _It's nothing_.* What was he supposed to do, pry her off like one might a leech? It wasn't as simple as the medieval practice of bloodletting.

"Je m'appelle Claire," she mumbled into his shirt. * _My name is Claire_.* Perhaps she slipped into her native tongue in stressful and traumatizing situations. It made sense. When Kol ever became upset, he often found himself cursing in Old Norse. It displayed her innocence and naïveté, though, that she outright assumed he could understand French. "Et vous, monsieur?"

Since he had utterly no idea what to do with his hands, he ended up resting one on the miniature human's head - _but only because it was convenient, bloody wankers, no reading into it._ "Kol. Je m'appelle Kol." _*My name is Kol_.*

Finally, she pulled away, and he suppressed a sigh of pure relief. Murdering people, that was swell. Burning houses down? Sure, sounded like a party. Getting so gloriously hammered that he stripped off his clothes and streaked through the Colosseum? Any other Tuesday. But an affectionate child? No, non, nein. That was where Kol drew the damn _line_.

It was a bizarre experience to converse with her, since she didn't bother looking up at him, her milky eyes staring into nothingness straight ahead. Instead, she tilted her ears toward him. "Merci beaucoup de me sauver." _*Thank you very much for saving me_.*

Kol wasn't used to being _thanked_ for anything. Mostly because, well, he never did anything _nice_. He hadn't an ounce of humanity left in him. Without thinking, he blurted out, "Er, yes, that's nice and all, but for the sake of my reputation, if this isn't kept between us, I will demolish all of London. Anyway, how's that sister of yours?"

The child's brow creased, and in a show of impressive intuition for one so young, she said slowly and carefully, "Monsieur, I never said I had a sister."

 _Oh, fuck me over sideways. No shit, Kol, step up your game._ "Yes, well . . ." For once, he chose the truthful route. "I heard your sister singing last night as you accompanied her on piano."

Her previously suspicious expression cleared up. "Je vais maintenant, Monsieur Kol." _*I see now, Mr. Kol._ * Then she giggled at herself, surprisingly him slightly. "Non, je ne vais pas. Mauvais choix de mots." _*No, I don't see. Bad choice of words_.*

Kol found himself chuckling at her quick-witted afterthought, much to his horror and disgust. Thus, he had to remove himself from the situation promptly. "Well, it was lovely meeting you and all, mademoiselle, but I must go . . . anywhere else." Now, that his job was complete, his conscious was light and airy as he strutted for the exit.

A tiny, timid little voice carried after him. "Monsieur?" He paused, after a moment's consideration. _No, dammit, keep going._ "I do not mean to bother you, monsieur, but les garçons threw my food into the mud and broke my walking stick. Ma grande soeur is working, and I do not know what to do."

 _Leave, Kol, leave her in the dust and massacre someone._ "I'm hungry, monsieur," the child whispered, as if ashamed of her body's needs.

 _Aw, hell._ "Fine," he bit, going back over to her with a scowl on his face that she wouldn't be able to see anyway. "I'm going to pick you up, so don't scream and cause a fuss." She stayed perfectly quiet as he placed each hand on her waist and hauled her up, balancing her on his right hip. Then, she just _had_ to circle her little arms around his neck, and lay her head on his shoulder. _Goddammit._

Kol wouldn't have picked her up in a million years if she could walk quickly on her own, but alas, those little gnomes ruined her walking stick. "Repeat _anything_ of this," he exited the church with her securely in his hold, "and you are dead to me."

" _Anything_."

"Shut up."

"D'accord, Monsieur Kol." _*Okay, Mr. Kol.*_

"Do not call me _Monsieur Kol_ , dammit, it's annoying."

"But that's your name. . . ."

"Shut up before I drown you in the gutter."

"D'accord, Monsieur Kol."

"I will destroy you."

"D'accord, Monsieur Kol."

"I will tear you limb from limb until there is nothing left of you."

". . . D'accord, Monsieur Kol."

"Dammit!"

* * *

 **Ella's Perspective**

I'd been wandering the streets, and garnering judgmental looks from both women and men alike, as the dirty whore whose pimp or client roughed her up. But at this point, I simply couldn't care anymore. It wasn't as if I was so presumptuous as to say they were _wrong_.

I performed a double take when I saw a tall, brown-haired man carrying a little girl who looked suspiciously like my petite soeur. Putain de merde - _she was_! Ignoring any and all other pedestrians, I sprinted over to the other side of the road, and without an ounce of contemplation, leapt straight onto his back.

I dug my long fingernails into his neck and pushed in until blood bubbled to the surface. "Let go of ma _petite soeur_!" The man's hard muscles rippled against my front and he had the damn nerve to _laugh_.

After setting my little sister down on her feet, he clasped his hands back onto my thighs and pinned them to his hips. "Aren't you forward?" he simpered, as my petite soeur giggled at the sounds of it all. His grip was like _iron_ , and as he turned his angular face to the side, I realized with a start that he was the man watching me from the night before. _Qu'est que c'est?_ * _What is this?*_

After struggling hard enough to inconvenience him, he allowed me to slither down from his back, and hoisted me in front of him, keeping his hands firmly attached to my waist. His smile was downright _devilish_. "Hello, darling."

I ground my teeth together, and if it was possible, he grinned even wider. "What are you doing with my little sister?" I demanded with a clenched jaw. "Monsieur, I swear to everything holy, if you kidnapped her, then _je te tuerai, morceau de merde_!" _*I will kill you, you piece of shit_!*

He barked out a pleased laugh, and blood rushed to my cheeks. "He saved me, Ella," my sister explained, and I quickly deflated. "From horrible boys who found me in the church. Monsieur Kol is kind."

The man's eyes bugged out at the mention of "kind," as if he were distinctly aware that nobody had ever called him that before. Then, his lips twisted into a sort of grimace, as if that _bothered_ him. But that wasn't what was on my mind.

Shaking free of Kol's clutch, I knelt down in front of Claire, and placed feather-light touches of pressure on each shoulder so she knew I was there. Now that I looked more closely, there were bloody marks on her face. "What do you mean des garçons found you in the church?" When she explained it to me in her childish way as Monsieur Kol waited impatiently by my side, I grew progressively angrier and angrier. I spat, envisioning my hands wringing out their little pathetic necks, "Je vais brûler l'église vers le bas avec ces fils de salopes à l'intérieur!" _*I'm going to burn the church down with those sons of bitches inside!_ *

"That seems a touch blasphemous, but I do love to set things on fire," Monsieur Kol hummed from above me. What a goddamn bastard he was, mocking my absolutely reasonable display of outrage!

"Ta gueule, connard," I snapped at him before I had the chance to think it through. Claire's delicate, almost white eyebrows mingled with her hairline and I fought back a cringe as Monsieur Kol clearly worked on translating the term in his mind.

I squeezed my eyes shut as I saw the comprehension and then a curious combination of mirth and annoyance bring light to his chocolate brown eyes, preparing for him to strike me across the face. I flinched as a hand brushed against my cheek, then found myself almost leaning into the touch; the last man to touch me so gently was my late papa, and he'd died more than six years before.

"Do you think I am going to hit you, darling?" His lips trailed against my jaw as he moved forward to whisper into my ear. "It appears -" with the tips of his fingers, he caressed a developing bruise on my cheekbone, ever so lightly - "that somebody already has."

My eyes fluttered open and I ducked my head away in shame, crossing my arms as a shield of sorts. But that was a mistake, for his eyes wandered to my shoulder, where the strap of my dress had lowered, and on full display was an violently red welt. Defensively, I tucked the fabric back into place, and his eyes met mine, his expression unreadable.

* * *

 **Kol's Perspective**

Kol had been amused when the red-haired little minx jumped onto his back, as if she could stand a chance in a fight with the most violent creature in all of history. Her barely contained rage toward the boys who attacked her sister had amused him even more. When she told him to fuck off and called him an asshole, that had amused him the _most_.

Kol was not amused when he saw the welts on her shoulder. It looked as if somebody attempted to whip the skin off her, and he found himself wondering where else the perpetrator hurt her. _Enough, Kol, you've killed hundreds of thousands of people, who cares about a bruise or a scrape or two?_

But yet . . . "Who did this?" he murmured, and she gnawed on her visibly swollen lips. The miniature human stumbled on her own feet as she endeavored to stay away from the current of pedestrians, so Kol found himself placing a lazy hand on her head to balance her for a moment. Surprisingly, she hadn't been bad company. In fact, the little thing entertained him with her dry humor and sharp intuition.

Kol had enjoyed the short amount of time he spent in the little girl's company more than he'd enjoyed anybody else's for years - decades, even, if he felt like being honest. It _disgusted_ him. He'd met his fair share of perky witches over the years, but he'd grown bored of each of them before the week's end. He hadn't grown bored of the miniature human, unfortunately.

The miniature human - Claire, Kol remembered - reached over and slipped her delicate fingers into his much larger hand and he jumped as if a bolt of lightning struck the earth not a meter away. She liked him. It was no surprise that Kol attracted women like flies to honey, considering he was woefully attractive, but she couldn't even _see_ him. It had to be his irresistible charisma.

She had called him kind. Obviously, she either had no clue what the word meant, or no man had hardly ever been kind to her and thus she had nothing to compare to. Nobody had ever called him kind, because he _wasn't_ kind. Yet, somehow, it endeared Kol to her. Nobody ever seemed to truly appreciate his company if he wasn't driving them to ecstasy in bed - at the very least, not his own _family_ , as they always left him out. Perhaps it was not _horrendously awful_ to feel appreciated, even if it was by a miniature human.

So, sue him, but he let her hold his hand. He was fully prepared to slaughter any and all unwanted witnesses.

The red-haired girl, Ella, had not answered yet, but he gave her the benefit of the doubt. He wanted to hear her sing again. He wanted her voice to tear through his blackened heart once more, so he could _feel_ something again. And no, Kol would _never_ admit this to anybody for as long as he lived, and if anybody found out, they would meet a brutal and sticky end.

"It does not matter, monsieur," she finally whispered, and Kol abruptly realized two things. One, it _did_ matter to him, for whatever pathetic reason, and two, she did not respect nor care about herself enough to stop the abuse. Her vibrant, revealing blue eyes flickered down to the little girl beside him, and he discovered the truth. Whatever was happening to her, whatever pain she was choosing to endure, she was doing it for her.

That was what a family was supposed to look like, Kol decided.

 **A/N: Imagining Kol with his own little family emits ungodly, fangirl-esque shrieks from me. I can't handle my own feels. Anyway, what did you lovely people think about this chapter? How will their interactions continue, and what will inevitably bring them closer together? Stay tuned! :D**


	3. Sin and Sanctuary

**A/N: You guys rock! Seriously, the response to this story has been nothing short of amazing, and I love you all for it! Every single review fills me with happiness, and I cherish them all. Thank you all :).**

 **I listened to all of you who liked the interactions between Kol and Claire, so I made sure to add a lot in here! I love writing them :). Now, as much as I adore Rebekah, I have to replace her on the character list with Elijah. She will play an important role in this story, but as the plot unravels in my head, I've realized that he plays a bigger part. Klaus plays an enormous role as well.**

 **Oh, and Claire gets her first perspective in this chapter!**

 **This chapter was a lot of fun to write. The interrogation of Claire by Kol was especially entertaining to me. Anyway, I won't hold you up, so please read, review, and enjoy! Thanks so much! :D**

 **Chapter 3: Sin and Sanctuary**

 **Ella's Perspective**

For some godforsaken reason, I let Monsieur Kol lead my sister and I back to the church. I did not trust him, not in the slightest, but . . . he saved Claire, when he didn't have to. And most people, I discovered, did not act without an ulterior motive. But he saved her, and asked for nothing in return. _Yet_.

The man had even bought us more than a week's worth of food, despite my vehement protests that I could take care of my sister on my own, thank you very much. But I ended up relenting, because I couldn't care less if _I_ starved, but Claire had to stay healthy. He informed me he could buy the entire city, if he wanted to, and I had to suppress the urge to smack him because, of course, I owed him.

He even found another stick for Claire. Claire was quite fond of him, I soon realized, which softened me to him, since she was an excellent judge of character. And he seemed to return at least a fraction of her affection, since whenever she tripped or stumbled, he shot out a hand to steady her. I didn't think he was doing it consciously, but still, I appreciated it more than I could begin to express.

Monsieur Kol was very handsome, with his sharply proportional, almost elfish features and wicked smile and equally wicked eyes. He was also very wealthy, based off his dapper and well-fitted clothes, and his irritating boasts. Although, there seemed to be some sort of red liquid staining the front of his shirt. It looked to be blood, but I immediately banished that ugly notion.

Claire, as if sensing the tension flitting between Kol and I, skipped ahead with her stick brandishing this way and that, recognizing the familiar path back to the abandoned church. "Whatever you want to say to me, monsieur," I sighed, "by all means, say it."

"You never answered my question," he remarked, fixing me with his piercing brown-eyed gaze. "Who did this to you?" He flourished a nimble hand up and down my battered form to accent his question.

The leash I had on my temper and emotions loosened. "It was a client, all right?" I stared straight ahead of me, willing myself not to cry. "I'm a prostitute. I sell my body and have miserable sex for a living. I am a lowly, insignificant _whore_. That's what everyone calls me behind my back, anyway, and sometimes to my face. Some clients like to rough us up, and this one saw it to fit to whip my entire body and slap me across the face when it suited him. Are you _satisfied_?"

The cold air stung against the multitude of my own kind of war wounds, and I shivered. Monsieur Kol did not respond, and his countenance was unfathomable. "Why were you there last night?" I whispered, and a muscle in his jaw tensed. Still, I continued, "I am a lot of things, but I am not stupid, monsieur. I hardly believe you were in the back doorway for benevolent purposes."

Monsieur Kol released a noncommittal hum of neither agreement nor opposition. I narrowed my eyes, and voiced the question that had been itching at the back of my mind ever since I saw him lingering in the church doorway. "Were you there to kill me, Monsieur Kol?"

He abruptly stopped in his path, and by default, so did I. His eyes were glimmering with something dark, wild, and carnal. Whoever Monsieur Kol was, he was no regular man. But perhaps I liked that about him, for I didn't have many pleasant experiences with regular men.

"What would you do if I said yes, darling?" His voice came out low and sultry, and swallowing hard, I realized with a start how much taller he was than me. Almost an entire head.

His reply did not surprise me. I knew it from the moment I laid eyes on him, that he was there to kill me. My heartbeat picked up its pace and I found it difficult to maintain eye contact with him. "I would take my petite soeur, and run," I whispered, staring off into the distance at the curling smoke rising from an old factory mill, polluting the skies. "Is that what you want to hear, monsieur? I have met men like you. You like knowing you hold power over others. But here is what I want to know."

Finally gathering the courage to meet his stormy gaze, I stepped closer, ignoring my instincts that screamed at me to snatch up Claire and run like hell in the opposite direction. "Why didn't you?"

The corners of his lips curved up into a smug smirk. "Your voice, darling. I'd never heard anything like it in all my years. The reason I did not kill you was your voice."

For some reason, that was not the answer I was expecting, but I bottled up and stowed away my surprise. "And if I did not sing in your presence, monsieur? You would have killed me, oui?"

His smirk did not waver. "Oui, _mademoiselle_. Now . . . what are you going to do about it?"

That did not bother me as much as it should have, perhaps because I placed little to no value on my own life. "Tell me this and tell it true. You were there to kill me. Would you have killed my little sister? If you say yes, then I will disappear with her, and this little game," I waved a trembling hand between us, "is over. You will never hear my voice again, and you will have to live in constant regret that you did not kill me when you could have."

To my grudging admiration, he did not even blink at the question. "I do not kill children, mademoiselle, and I was not planning to start yesterday, nor do I plan to begin today. What does that change, darling?"

A weight loosened from my shoulders, and I allowed a teasing smile to toy at my lips, standing on the balls of my feet until my lips were only a hair's length away from his. "Nothing . . . everything."

And that was when I heard my sister scream.

* * *

 **Claire's Perspective**

Monsieur Kol was a strange man. He constantly threatened me with bodily harm, but when I tripped, he would always help me up. I did not understand him, but you don't need to understand someone to like them, do you? I didn't know, but I hoped that was true.

He saved me. The boys seemed terribly frightened of him, but I wasn't. Besides my sister, I never had any friends before, and now Monsieur Kol was my friend. At least, I hoped so. It might've been a one-sided friendship, but it was better than nothing at all.

Ella and Monsieur Kol did not like each other, it seemed. She insulted him in French, and he understood her. He sounded angry at her, as if he wanted to _hurt_ her. I dearly hoped Monsieur Kol wouldn't hurt my grande soeur, because then I couldn't be friends with him anymore. Because I would kill him with my new walking stick, and corpses weren't good company.

Ella and Monsieur Kol were talking fiercely, so I decided that my presence was probably unwanted, and moved ahead since I recognized the path back to the old abandoned church. The ground was rough and uneven, and even with my stick, I still stumbled a few times, but Monsieur Kol wasn't there to balance me. I didn't need his help, though, I decided. I could very well walk on my own.

My nose scrunched up at the rancid stench tickling my nostrils. Smoke, I realized the scent was. It smelled like something was _burning._ I took a few hesitant, careful steps forward and winced at the blast of sudden heat pelting against my cheeks. Lowering to my knees, I groped around with my hands, feeling for any familiar landmarks. My fingers brushed over an old, rotting carriage wheel and I discovered I was close to home.

My lips parted in horror. The church. It was the _church_ that omitted that awful smell. The church was on fire!

I scrambled to my feet and gripped my walking stick so tight my fists trembled. Ella, I needed to tell Ella to stay back. "It's the ghost girl!" a boy hollered, and my heart froze solid in my chest.

I recognized the voice, and then strained to listen for others. It was the boys from earlier! They must have returned to get their revenge. . . . "Get her!"

I shuffled backwards, holding my walking stick like one might a sword. _No,_ I wasn't going to let them hurt me again. Poking out my tongue in determination, I swung out the stick as somebody approached me from my left, his shoes scuffing against the concrete being the main giveaway. It connected with its target _\- hard._

I grinned wide in triumph as the boy cried out in pain and surprise, but didn't have much time to celebrate before a hand fumbled for my dress front. Angrily, I jabbed forward with an elbow, but more hands were already dragging me forward. "Let me go, let me go, _laisse-moi partir_!"

I tried to lock my feet into cracks and small craters in the concrete, but it only left me with a twisted ankle and a building fear. "She's a freak!" one of them barked. "Throw her in the fire before she kills us first!"

What, no! "I'm not going to kill you," I growled, kicking out in every possible direction. "If I could, I _would,_ but I can't, so _let me go_!"

The sweltering air around me licked at my skin and nipped with its unbearable heat. Terror coursed through me and my heart might've thundered out of my chest. Grubby fingers clamped onto the back of my neck and shoved my face forward into the flames.

I screamed louder than I ever did in my whole life.

* * *

 **Kol's Perspective**

Kol figured out what was happening in a fraction of a second. The miniature human was shrieking her little lungs out and _\- fire._

He paid no attention to Ella's panicked cries behind him, and blurred the rest of the way to the church, his countenance darkening with rage. No, he didn't care about the miniature human, but he didn't necessarily want her to _die._

Two boys, probably near Bekah's physical age at eighteen, held the girl by her shoulders as they shoved her face into the fire. Her pasty cheeks turned red and black as the skin began to melt off, and the sound that erupted from her tiny body was inhuman.

Kol snapped the necks of the boys holding her, and they collapsed to the ground like a stack of bricks. Reaching forward, he yanked the little girl away from the fire, and cringed slightly at the horrendous damage done to her innocent face. Biting hard into his wrist, he forced blood down her throat, and watched in _mild_ relief as her skin knitted itself back together.

The other younger boys fled from the scene with their tails between their legs, but Kol made note of their scents so he could perhaps find them later and make orphans of them.

The miniature human burst into tears, big fat droplets rolling down her healing cheeks. Several inches of hair were singed black, he noticed. Those would have to be cut. "You are safe now," he made himself say. "Nobody will hurt you anymore."

Much to his absolute shock, she once again dove into his arms, and clung to him as if her life depended on it. "You're an angel," she murmured against the side of his neck, " _my_ angel." Kol swallowed hard. He stood up with her safely tucked in his hold, mostly because she held onto him like a spider monkey and it would be too much hassle to pry her off. Yes, that was most certainly it.

A thunderous heartbeat garnered his attention, and he spun around to see a horrified Ella staring back at him, open-mouthed. "T-They tried to kill her." Upon hearing the sound of her voice, the miniature human reached out for her older sister, who gladly accepted her. "Y-You killed them instead. You moved so fast, I've never seen anything move so fast -"

Kol stepped forward, and began the process of compelling her. "You will not speak of this to anybody else."

Her pupils dilated. "I will not speak of this to anybody else."

"Good girl." He made a snap decision. If he left them behind, they had no home or possessions, and were at liberty to be raped or murdered. He needed to hear the red-haired girl sing again, so he couldn't have that, could he? "We will be going back to my dwelling, and you will not protest or attempt to run."

"I will not protest or attempt to run."

He broke off the compulsion, and reached for the little girl, whose brow was creased deeply with confusion, and he swore under his breath. The little thing was _blind_ , her eyes clouded over with cataracts. Compulsion would not work on her. Kol snatched her back from Ella, who opened her mouth to protest, but no words came out. "Follow me," he snapped.

His pace was almost too fast for the red-haired singer to keep up with, but he didn't bother slowing down. He had to ensure the miniature human's silence. "What did you hear?" he muttered into her ear. "Be honest, or I'll toss you and your sister under a carriage."

"You killed them," she whispered back. "You killed them, and made my sister listen to you. You did something to her mind."

Well, color him impressed. He knew she was perceptive, but he hadn't realized she was _that_ perceptive. She was more intelligent than most of the people he'd met in the last half of a century. "And what do you plan on doing with that information?"

"Keep it to myself," she replied almost smugly. "Who would I tell? I know only Ella, and you saved me. I do not care if they're dead. They deserve to be dead."

A smirk slowly spread across his face, and he handed her back to the red-haired singer. "Fair enough."

Kol hailed a carriage to transport the trio downtown, to his not-so-humble abode. Frankly, he didn't care where he lived. He moved around so much, it was impractical to spend so much money on lavish mansions and the like. But still, it was mostly Nik's money he'd gotten a hold of, so he decided to treat himself.

Once they'd arrived to his home and Ella had made enough mildly insulting observations to clear the air, he compelled her to situate herself in one of the free bedrooms so he could have a more thorough interrogation of the human child.

"So I killed these boys, and you're all right with it," he said, after situating her on the couch and sitting across from her on the coffee table to appear intimidating, then remembered again that she couldn't see him. _Goddammit_.

The miniature human was annoyingly calm and unbothered. Her little legs swung back and forth and she childishly twiddled her thumbs together, but she looked relatively unworried. More bored, really. "Oui."

"What is wrong with you?" he asked, genuinely curious, as he poured himself a healthy glass of bourbon.

She slumped against the couch cushions, her lower lip jutting out slightly. "You're the one who killed them, _pas_ _moi_."

The miniature human had a reasonable point. "Mmmhmm. You're missing an important question, though. _How_ did I kill them?" Kol had absolutely no idea whatsoever what he was attempting to prove. The child was ridiculously naïve, and he needed her to realize how much danger she was in.

She blinked - once, then twice. "I dunno."

"I snapped their necks."

Again, no discernible reaction. "D'accord." * _Okay._ *

Kol bristled. "I could kill you in less than a second. I could snap your little neck, or rip your heart straight from your chest. Or I could drain you of blood, every single damned drop. Are you _okay_ about that?"

The child only seemed to notice the last part of his rant. "Are you a vampire?" she asked point-blank. "If you want to drink my blood, then you're a vampire."

 _Oh, bloody hell_. Forget his previous assumptions, this child was smarter than half the people he'd met over his entire _lifetime_. More than half, if he was being honest with himself. He crossed his arms over his chest and narrowed his eyes. "You're right. I'm a vampire. I'm nine hundred years old, and I'm one of the oldest and most powerful creatures in this entire world. Killing humans means nothing to me. In fact, _less_ than nothing. I've killed hundreds of thousands of humans without a single ounce of remorse."

Obviously, her immature mind could not comprehend such high numbers in comparison to anything else, but at this point, Kol was involuntarily unloading his burdens on an unsuspecting child, and he knew how pathetic that was. He also didn't care how pathetic that was. He hadn't had any confidants in over seventy years, if his rotten family was meant to count for anything. "I am feared and hated. Earlier, you said I was an angel. I am not. My brother likes to say he's the devil in disguise. I am not. I'm the devil, darling, and I don't need any bloody disguise to tear your throat out."

Finally, he noticed her heartbeat picking up speed, but still, any other child her age would have run out in tears and shrieking their annoying little heads off. She did not move. "Are you going to kill me?" she asked very softly.

He scoffed and downed the rest of his drink. "No."

"Are you going to kill my sister?"

"No." But then, he thought the better of it, and decided to amend his statement. "You asked in the church why I watched your sister yesterday. I wanted to kill her. I was prepared to kill her. I was prepared to drink her until she was dry, and I would have left without even bothering to clean up the mess. I would have left you with nobody to care for you, and it wouldn't have bothered me in the slightest."

"But you didn't," she whispered so quietly he had to strain to hear her.

"What?" he snapped, forcing her to repeat her moronic claim.

"You didn't," she reiterated, more confidently this time. "You didn't kill my sister."

What a blithering idiot! "But I _wanted_ to."

"But you _didn't_."

"I very well could have."

"You didn't."

"I was about to, before she started to sing."

"You didn't."

All right, now Kol was downright angry. "I wanted to kill her and watch the light _leave_ her eyes."

The child remained undaunted. "You didn't."

" _Will you stop saying that_?!" he bellowed, slamming his glass down onto the table so hard it shattered into a million pieces. Finally, he achieved his desired reaction. The little girl cowered away, her heart fluttering like a hummingbird's wings inside of her chest, bowing her head as if she was afraid he would strike her.

 _Finally_ , she felt fear, but it didn't make Kol feel any better, he realized. "I would have killed your sister," he said hoarsely, "if I had not heard her voice. I will not kill you, or your sister. That doesn't make me any _less_ of a monster, mind you. Do the lives I've ended violently over nine hundred years mean anything to you?"

The little girl tilted her head to the side, curious. "No."

No sugar-coating it, no flowery avoidance, no tricky lies. Merely _no_. He snorted, but it secretly peeked his interest. "No? You've decided to turn your back on the human race, have you?"

A dark shadow of anger flickered across her soft features, odd on a human so young, without any _real_ experience in the world. "They do not care about me," she said simply. "Why should I care about them? I do not know them, and I do not love them. Why should I feel sorry for them? You say you are a monster, Monsieur Kol. But so are they."

Perhaps she had more experience in the real world than Kol originally perceived. She would make an excellent vampire, he realized. "You will get yourself killed one day," he warned her bluntly.

For the first time in the conversation, she smiled. "But not today."

Kol leaned back and studied her with a calculating gaze. Only when she began fidgeting again and tugging at a stray thread on her old dress did he remember she was a child. "Not today," he repeated slowly. "Not today."

He led the child to a spare guest bedroom and watched as she snuggled into the blankets, releasing a sigh of content. It had likely been a long time since she'd slept in a bed. Closing the door behind him and suddenly feeling weary, he began to unbutton his shirt and head to his own bedroom. He didn't require more than a couple hours of sleep a night, but something about the conversation he just had drained him to the core.

His fatal mistake was that he hadn't been paying any attention to the red-haired singer, and he stopped in his tracks as he entered his room. There she lay on his bed, naked as the day she was born. _The ONE time I simply want to sleep . . ._

Scars and fresh wounds littered her bare skin, and it must have caused her no insignificant amount of pain, for she squirmed around on his mattress. He blinked. "Have you found the wrong room, darling?"

The red-haired girl sat up, her curly tangled hair bouncing with the movement. "You may have me, monsieur," she murmured, keeping her eyes glued to the ground. "Take me."

Well, she didn't sound very happy about it, now did she? If Kol decided to share some of his sexual expertise, he'd rock her very universe, but alas, it appeared she was not ready. He arched a brow. "I have your full permission, do I? You may be a consort, but I find it hard to believe you would jump from bed to bed of your own choosing."

She gave him a smile that did not reach her eyes. "You are allowing us to stay here, if only for a night or two. I know men like you, Monsieur Kol." Lithely, like a wildcat, she stood up and moved over to him, her bouncing, ample, scarred breasts on display. "You do not do things without an ulterior motive. You don't do nice things without wanting something in return. It is not in your nature."

For some bizarre reason, Kol felt inexplicable anger rise inside of him. No, she most certainly did _not_ know men like him. Because Kol was not a man. He was a monster. Yes, she was right, he did not do anything without an ulterior motive, or without expecting something in return. But in comparison to the miniature human's utter appreciation of his murderous actions, this was a bit of a letdown.

So, he decided to manipulate her, and see how far she was willing to continue her act. Why? Because it was fun, and he had the power to do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted. But first, he declared, "I remove my compulsion that took away your ability to protest, but keep all of the other ones in place." Kol was a lot of things, and many of them terrible, but he was not a rapist.

The girl blinked and her eyes cleared, but still, she did not back down. _Interesting_. "Very well," he mused. "If you are offering, then I would be uncouth to deny a beautiful lady, wouldn't I?" Much to his surprise, she did not so much as blush, so desensitized to anything sexual in nature, he presumed.

"Oui, monsieur," she muttered. "Shall we?" She pointed to his bed.

"How very forward of you," he hummed, positively amused. "Follow me, mademoiselle." Kol led the way into his large, spacious bathroom and moved to fill his bathtub with water, turning on his boiler in the process. "I can hardly have sex with you looking like that." He waved his hand at her series of ugly, fresh wounds, and she stiffened at the remark. Smirking at her hesitance, he nodded his head at the tub. "Get in."

Wincing, she climbed into the bathtub as the water level rose and rose. To continue his charade, Kol began to strip his clothes, tossing them aside easily. The girl kept her eyes down. Grabbing a sponge, Kol stepped inside of the tub himself, and signed in content as the hot water shifted around him. "Turn around," he ordered, and she obeyed, but not without a slight glare first. "Hmmm." Kol had a strange urge to rip apart the man who whipped her bloody.

"Stay still." Soaking the sponge in water, he began to dab it against her damaged skin, slowly but surely cleaning the dried blood away. It would have been easier to simply give her his blood first, but Kol liked making things harder. Clouds of pink and brown swirled into the bath water as blood and dirt slid off her. He became less chaste in where he chose to wash her, but she did not protest. "That's it, darling, good girl."

"Is there a purpose to this, monsieur?" she bit shortly, her glistening naked body taut with apprehension.

"Yes, of course," he crooned into her ear, splashing water onto her tangled red hair. He trailed his lips up her shoulder, and pressed them ever so lightly against her collarbone. "I never do anything without a reason." That wasn't necessarily true, but it sounded good at the time.

She stiffened beneath his touch, and he grinned against her neck. Without offering any sense of warning, he flipped her into her back, resting his hand comfortably between her breasts. "Do you mind, darling? I hope not." Gripping each side of the bathtub, he lowered himself over her, his bare chest pressing against hers. Her eyes flashed with fear and lust alike as she adjusted herself accordingly.

"Is this how you like it, monsieur?" she murmured against his heated neck, dragging her slender fingers through his thick brown hair, tugging at the ends in a way that made him almost groan.

"Yes," he replied, smirking. "You asked me earlier if I wanted to have sex with you . . . If I wanted to make love to your sweet, tender body. Do you want my answer?"

Her fingers gripped handfuls of his hair. "Oui, monster," she said huskily, and for once, he knew it wasn't a façade.

Kol lowered himself until there was no space between them, and brushed his lips against her soft cheek. "No."

And with that, he climbed out of the tub, grabbed his clothes off the floor and strolled out of the bathroom, leaving her breathless, confused, and alone.

 **A/N: Ahhhh, Kol's so hilariously cruel. What'd you guys think about this installment! I'd love to hear from you, since I love feedback ;).**


	4. Angel of Music

**A/N: Hi fam, how's it hanging? Happy fourth of July to those who are Americans, and those who aren't, have a fantastic day anyway! I had a lot of fun writing this chapter - a** ** _lot_** **of fun, I tell you. All of your reviews, favorites, and follows have been nothing short of amazing and I thank you from the bottom of my heart. They make me so very happy.**

 **Now, I thought I'd make something clear. Ella and Kol are definitely the main relationship, and this will become clear in this chapter. It will shift between Kol's and Ella's perspectives accordingly.**

 **Claire will become like a little sister to Kol, and he will become like a big brother to her. She** ** _will_** **end up with a certain Original hybrid, though, and form an interesting (platonic!) relationship with Elijah.**

 **Warning: Vague flashback (dream) of rape on underage girl (Ella).**

 **Disclaimer: I haven't used this in a while, lol. I don't own anything of the Originals, even though I really wish I could keep Kol all for myself. I can't :(. I only own Ella and Claire, so I will have to satisfy myself by living vicariously through them. Hah.**

 **Oh, and I don't own the song _Greensleeves._ That's about five hundred years before my time. Henry VIII probably wrote that about his second wife, Anne Boleyn, the mother of Elizabeth I. **

**Chapter 4: Angel of Music**

 **Ella's Perspective**

I stayed in the bathtub for a long time after Monsieur Kol left, hating myself for the disappointment that rooted inside of me. Never before had I ever _wanted_ to give myself to a man, but Monsieur Kol felt different somehow.

Sighing, I remembered that Claire's hair was singed and her skin was ashy from the fire, so I decided to bathe her before she dirtied one of Monsieur Kol's fancy beds. Snatching a stray towel, I wrapped it around my aching but considerably cleaner body, and tip-toed into the hall in search of my petite soeur. It was strange. My heart had been gripped with panic and rage with what happened to her, and utter bewilderment in how Monsieur Kol managed to save her, but I physically was unable to tell anybody else.

She was asleep in a guest room, her pillow already stained black and filthy. _Poor child._ "Claire," I whispered, shaking her gently by the shoulder to wake her up. "Claire, get up."

Her milky white eyes peeled open, and her lower lip jutted out in a pout. "No. Sleep." She released incoherent whimpering noises as I scooped up her frail, tiny form, and cradled her to my chest. "Je veux dormir." * _I want to sleep._ *

"So do I, baby, but we don't always get what we want." Carrying her into the bathroom, I made quick work in stripping her of her ruined old dress. The water wasn't exactly clean, but it was better than any water she'd been exposed to in a long time. She was covered in layers and layers of dirt and grime, collected over the months we'd moved from shelter to shelter. I wasn't particularly attached to the church and we didn't have many possessions, so I didn't mourn its loss.

Sorrow pinched my chest at the bones protruding from her little body. I tried my hardest to earn money to feed the little girl, but it was never enough. If I had taken care of her better, maybe . . . maybe she wouldn't have gone blind. A soft, serene smile touched my lips as she dropped her typical aloofness and began to play in the bath water, splashing the surface with her hands. "It's warm!" she announced, awed. A mischievous shadow crossed her face and she cupped as much water as she could in her tiny hands, then splashed it into me. "Now you are too."

I couldn't help but grin away. "You little imp." Claire dove underneath the surface and mimicked swimming strokes. The tips of her white-blonde hair were burned black, and frowning, I rummaged through Monsieur Kol's drawers to find a pair of scissors. Once the little girl broke through the surface and gasped for air, I snatched at her hair. "Hold still, _ma chérie._ " Snipping off a good three inches of her hair so it rested on her shoulders, I tossed the scissors aside. "I'm surprised only your hair was burned."

Claire smacked her palms against the surface of the water again. "I got burned, aussi."

Knitting my eyebrows together, I smoothed hair out of her forehead. "Non, Claire. Your skin would be red and hurt, ma petite soeur." I stroked the back of my hand against her baby-soft cheek. "It's smooth."

She shook her little head vigorously, and water went spraying in all directions. "The fire touched me. It hurt a lot. Monsieur Kol fixed me."

I tilted my head to the side, bewildered. "Monsieur Kol _fixed_ you?"

She nodded slowly, as if she thought I was one of the dumbest people she had the misfortune of coming across. "Oui, that's what I said."

I dipped my fingers into the water and swirled it around idly. "I think you are remembering wrong, little one."

Her expression was stony. "No, I'm not. He put something in my mouth, and I drank it, and then I was better. Oh, and Monsieur Kol is a vampire."

I snorted, flicking her on the forehead. "And who told you that? Monsieur Kol?"

She wrinkled her nose and slapped my hand away. " _Oui_."

"He was lying to toy with your head, ma chérie. . . ."

Crossing her arms, she scooted as far away from me as possible. "He told me. He's a vampire and he's nine hundred years old and he kills people. A lot of people. But I don't care, because he didn't kill you or me."

Before I could object to her ridiculous claim, Monsieur Kol appeared in the doorway with a crooked smirk, and I stifled a shriek of surprise. _Dear lord, how does he move so quietly?_ "That didn't take you long to spill, did it? And to think I began to _trust_ you." He sounded more mocking than annoyed.

"It's my grande soeur," the little girl protested, and I looked back and forth between them, completely nonplussed, "that does not count. I won't tell anyone else. I don't _know_ anyone else."

I scrambled to my feet, keeping my towel wrapped firmly around me. "Tell _what_?" I glowered at Monsieur Kol for whatever lies he hammered into Claire's head. "That you're a _vampire_?"

"And that he's nine hundred years old and kills a lot of people," Claire added helpfully, splashing the water once more. "A lot of people. That's what he said. But I don't care. Because I'm not dead, and you're not dead, and that's all that matters."

"She's an adorable little sociopath, isn't she?" Kol taunted from his spot where he leaned against the doorway, arms crossed. "It's refreshing. It's so tiring to hear ' _Oh, that's despicable and unnecessary_ ' or ' _Why are you any better than them_?' or ' _Don't you remember what it's like to be human_?' I don't care. Because I am. And no, I don't."

"Well, I guess that cuts through the bullshit," I said dryly, and he barked out a laugh, grinning away. "I won't bother to say any of that, then. I still think you're lying, but if you aren't, then I'm too tired and sick of life to care. Kill anyone you want, as long as it isn't my petite soeur. Does that make me selfish? Maybe. I don't care. I'm going to bed. Bonne nuit." _*Good night_.*

Grabbing another towel, I lifted my baby sister from the bathtub and wrapped it around her. She wound her arms around my neck for safekeeping. Monsieur Kol held something out from behind his back. "Here." He tossed my dress at me, then a shirt, and I stared at the latter blankly. He rolled his eyes to the ceiling. "For your sister. Her dress was rather scorched. I don't want it to dirty my sheets."

I couldn't help but smirk at him. "Of course, monsieur. _That's_ why." His smug expression melted away and he glowered at me. "You have a heart somewhere in there, Monsieur Kol. It doesn't have to be a bad thing."

And then, I left him in the bathroom, as he abandoned me before. I may or may not have taken _far_ too much satisfaction out of that, if almost dropping Claire in my glee was any inclination.

After I slipped Kol's shirt onto her, Claire fell asleep as soon as her damp little head connected with the pillow. "Bonne nuit, ma chérie," I whispered, pressing a tender kiss onto her forehead before sliding in next to her. _*Good night, my dear_.*

It was much more difficult for sleep to claim me than I originally anticipated. My mind would simply not switch off, as I replayed the events of the day over and over again. First, a man whipped me bloody and then fucked me until I was aching and sobbing. Then, I found the strange man from the night before who I was now certain was there to murder me, carrying my baby sister. And I flirted with said man. Claire was almost caught in the blazing church, and the aforementioned strange man saved her. I propositioned him for sex, because I assumed that's what he wanted, and he played me like a fiddle, when I thought _I_ had been manipulating _him_. And now, Claire and I were staying in this man's house for an unknown amount of time without any mention of payment.

All in all, I seriously fucked up.

Somehow, as I lay there, stressed out of my mind and stiff as a board, I drifted into a restless slumber, and I was plagued by most recurring nightmare.

* * *

 _I was twelve, on the cusp of turning thirteen. I stood over my petite soeur's crib, watching the toddler kick in her sleep, her white-blonde hair arranged in adorable little ringlets around her temple. "Dormez bien, ma chérie."_ *Sleep well, my dear.*

 _Ma mère was passed out drunk in her bedroom, out like a light. She had never been the same since mon papa died. Nor had I. He had been my favorite person in the entire world, and he didn't even live long enough to see his second daughter enter the world. He would have adored her, like he adored me._

 _Mon beau-père, or my step-father, had married ma mère less than a year after my father died. I never forgave her for that. What she saw in him, I hadn't the foggiest clue. Money, most likely. He worked at a shoe factory, and he always smelled like leather._

 _Quietly, as to not wake little Claire, I slipped out from the nursery and tip-toed over to my bedroom. The front door banged open, and this was where the_ real _nightmare started._

 _I stood in the doorway of my bedroom, as still as a statue. My heart froze solid in my chest. My step-father, Pierre, stumbled in._

 _I remembered the smallest details most of all. His scarred lips were twisted into a mean scowl. A thick stubble lined his bony face; he hadn't shaved in days. His pale brown hair stood up in tufts, thinning near the top. His red-rimmed hazel eyes swept our tiny living room until they landed on me, and remained there. There was a hungry glint to them, one I had never seen directed at me before._

" _Bonjour, Ella," he crooned, a lopsided smile splitting his face apart. He was drunk; drunker than usual. I hadn't known that he'd been fired that day, and so he downed an extra bottle of hard liquor. "Vous avez grandi très belle, ma fille."_ *You have grown very beautiful, my daughter.*

 _I clenched my fists so hard they shook. "Je ne suis pas ta fille."_ *I am not your daughter.*

 _His eyes darkened, and he licked his lips. "Non, tu n'es pas."_ *No, you are not.*

 _The dream blurred and skipped around as my mind danced around the trauma. But it ended as it always did. With the frightening growth in his pants, how my bedroom door didn't close in time, how he broke the handle in his drunken fury._

 _The sensations and emotions were as real in the nightmare as they were then. He pushed me onto the bed, unbuckled his pants . . . he was on top of me, groaning into my neck . . . I screamed until I was hoarse, but nobody, nobody, nobody came . . . It must've woken up little Claire, because she screamed along with me, a harmony of pain._

 _The nightmare neared its end when he roughly pulled out of me after finishing himself, and shuffled out of my room without a care in the world, kicking the door closed behind him, leaving me in utter darkness. And I lay there, petrified, for the rest of the night, unable to sleep, unable to move . . ._

 _I found the blood on my mattress, on my sheets, on my nightgown, between my legs. The blood was everywhere, everywhere, everywhere . . ._

* * *

I shot up, the sheets crumpling to my knees. A heavy sheen of sweat coated my entire body, and my dress was soaked. Frantically, I looked to Claire, but she remained unbothered and content in her slumber. _Thank God for small favors_.

Unable to help myself, I slithered out from under the blankets, needing a dose of fresh air. The nightmare always felt so _real_. If I remembered closely enough, I could still feel the agony between my legs, and the smell of leather suffocating my senses. He had always smelled like leather . . . I hoped he was dead. I hoped he rotted in hell. I hoped he and ma mère _both_ rotted in hell.

He murdered me, murdered everything that made me myself, and yet, I was still woefully alive. If it were not for Claire, I would have liked to have died that day, so my body could join my soul.

Air, air, I needed _air_. As silently as possible, I slipped from the guest room, ducking out into the grand yet surprisingly bare hall. Nausea churned at my stomach, and my knees wobbled beneath me. Tears stained my face, and I furiously wiped them away. I found a large bay window leading to a balcony with a lovely view of the city, and stepped out. The cool night breeze pelted against my cheeks, tousled my still-drying curls.

"Can't sleep?" I jumped, but didn't turn around, too entranced in the ocean of buildings and sea of lights. Monsieur Kol moved beside me, his chocolate brown eyes fixed on the city horizon. "It is a wonderful view, isn't it? My brother has an eye for aesthetics, and perhaps it rubbed off on me."

"You're above everyone else," I murmured, trailing my fingers up and down the wooden railing. "As if you rule this place, in the shadows, and nobody knows the truth . . ."

I could feel his intent gaze burn into me, but I did not look at him. "You know the truth now."

I loosed a bitter, humorless laugh. "Do I, Monsieur Kol? According to Claire, you're a vampire, who's nine hundred years old, who's killed thousands of people."

He didn't even hesitate. "Hundreds of thousands." I swallowed hard. Despite my best efforts, I believed him. "Does that frighten you? And call me Kol, for God's sake."

Finally facing him, I leaned against the balcony railing, folding my arms. His expression was guarded and searching; he was analyzing my every move and reaction. "For me to be frightened, _Kol_ , that implies that I care whether I live or die."

His lips flattened into a thin line, and I gave myself back to the extraordinary view. "How old are you?" he asked quietly.

If I looked closely enough, I could see the faint imprints of people moving in the streets. Each one of them had their own life, their own love, their own purposes for living. They did not matter to Kol. But I realized, as I observed them with hardened, cynical eyes, that they did not matter to me either. "Sixteen."

He released a hum of acknowledgement. "And how long have you been a courtesan?"

I moistened my dry, parched lips. "Three years."

Another thoughtful nod. "How long has your sister been blind?"

This time, my heart clenched inside of my chest. It was _my_ fault she lost her sight, and nobody else's. ". . . For a year now."

"How long have you been singing for?"

What was this, an interrogation? Still, I found no reason not to answer. It's not like I could go back to sleep after that nightmare. "My entire life. My father sang, and he taught me everything he knew."

"And where is he now?"

I sucked in a sharp breath. "Dead."

"And your mother?"

This time, my lips curled up into a sardonic, jaded smirk. "Dead to me."

He laughed and surprised, I turned back to him. But there was a coldness to his laughter, a gateway to harsh realities. "It's the other way around for me. She's dead, and he ought to be. It appears you understand how utterly disappointing family turns out to be."

I was shaking my head before he even finished. "Not ma petite soeur. Never Claire. The world can burn around me, but as long as I have her, then everything is okay."

Kol gripped the railing so hard it splintered beneath his fingers, but he didn't seem to notice. "How wonderful it must be to have siblings that care whether you live or die. Mine hardly notice my existence, and when I'm there, they want me gone."

I looked deep into the endless brown abyss of his eyes, straight into his twisted, wounded soul. "Then fuck them."

* * *

 **Kol's Perspective**

"Then fuck them." That was not what Kol expected the girl to say. Most people responded in the same manner, with a slight variance to the patronizing phrase.

" _I'm sure that's not true."_

" _They love you, you just don't see it."_

" _Of course they care about you, you're their brother."_

But not her. She did not attempt to make excuses, nor try to undermine his feelings of hatred. She accepted his words at face value; she was on _his_ side. Not Nik's, not Elijah's, not Bekah's - _Kol's._ He nodded curtly, turning away from her.

Finally, after a good long stretch of silence, he murmured, "Perhaps my little sister is not as bad as the rest of them." Rebekah was a royal pain in the ass, but he enjoyed riling her up; it was one of his favorite pastimes. And, in a way, she had always been his partner in crime.

Ella flashed Kol a brief smile. "Little sisters are a wonderful thing." He wouldn't call Rebekah a "wonderful thing," but alas, he supposed she was his favorite sibling if he _had_ to choose. Better than Nik who constantly daggered him, or Elijah who occasionally helped. He almost laughed. What low standards Bekah managed to surpass.

"Monsieur," he sent her a dirty look, ". . . _Kol_ , why are we here? Why are you letting us stay here? What do you _want_?"

There was a light splatter of freckles peppered all over her nose and cheeks, he noticed. It was cute. She sounded far too jaded and suspicious for such a young human girl. But, alas, she had a point. "I do not want to have sex with you," he began, as she clearly had assumed that from the get-go.

She grimaced. "I've come to that conclusion. You cannot possibly want money, when you live _here_ , and I . . ."

Kol nodded in mocking agreement. "Considering you are a prostitute living on the streets who sells her body and soul to feed her sister, I don't think that's a very wise investment." He angered her at that, he knew, as he meant to - but he decided to take mercy on her, and tell her the truth. "I want you to sing to me."

Her orange eyebrows shot up, mingling with her fiery hairline. Her vibrant cobalt eyes widened in surprise, and he realized yet again that she hadn't an ounce of self-worth left. "That's it," she said, incredulous. "That _cannot_ be it."

Kol climbed over the balcony railing and sat down, allowing his legs in the open night air with a terrifying drop - for humans. "You can't accept anything at face-value, can you, darling?" Although she had before, when speaking about his siblings. What a contradiction she was turning out to be. She pursed her chapped lips, and he took that as his answer. "Come, join me." He patted the space next to him.

Any other human who valued their life in any degree or manner would have rejected his request immediately. The red-haired singer did not. She hoisted herself over as he did, and gingerly lowered herself next to him. Ella glanced at the ground below - a good twenty meters down, but did not flinch. She truly did not care if she lived or died, if not for her _petite soeur_. "You look like you're in dire need of fun," he informed her, and she snorted. "Darling, you've found the right homicidal maniac."

Kol leapt straight off the balcony, sailing downward and enjoying the rush of the fall as the gush of air tickled through his thick mane of hair. Ella's shriek of concern did not go unnoticed. He landed gracefully on his feet, and looked upward to see the red-haired singer gaping at him. "You've been burned by men," he said, more of a statement than a question. "You'll find that I'm not a normal man."

"I've figured that out for myself, _merci_ , I'm not in any need of your expertise," she called down, dry as sand and as quick as a flash. He chuckled to himself, enjoying her instantaneous comebacks.

Kol opened up his arms, smirking as he did so. "Jump."

The girl arched her brows, and swung her legs to and fro, a childish gesture, but it displayed her nervous tendencies. "While I appreciate your offer, I wasn't planning on spending the evening as a splatter on the side of an alleyway. What an unimpressive way to die."

He rolled his eyes; she was a stubborn one, wasn't she? " _Jump_ ," he reiterated more strongly this time, then chose to clarify. "I'll catch you."

The girl laughed, the sound ringing clear and bell-like into the night. He rather liked the sound of her laugh - it obviously was a rare occurrence, and it pleased him that it stirred in his presence. "What's the purpose of you catching me if we both end up stains on the concrete, _Monsieur Kol_?" Oh, she tacked that onto the end for the sole purpose of annoying him.

How he liked pretty little things with sharp tongues. "Love, you saw how I landed, light as a feather! You _know_ I can catch you, you're simply too pigheaded to admit it. _Jump_ , darling!"

She gnawed at her lips, clearly at war with herself. But then, she made a decision, and in hindsight, it was the choice that altered the course of his life permanently. Irreversibly.

The red-haired singer jumped. She propelled herself off the balcony, lithe as a wildcat, her voluminous locks of hair streaming about her like an explosion of fire lighting up the cloudy night. Her old, raggedy dress ballooned around her, revealing her milky white beauties of legs, marred by the bastard man who whipped her bloody. She released a shout of excitement, and his arms twitched in anticipation.

Ella landed safely in his arms, her breath hot and uneven against his neck. In one smooth motion, he swept up her legs and held her in a bridal hold. "Hello, darling. Now . . . _sing for me_."

* * *

 **Ella's Perspective**

He caught me. The son of a bitch kept his word, and he caught me. Nobody ever maintained their promises, and I hardly thought a "nine hundred-years-old murderous vampire" would be the first.

And yet, he was. It struck me how close his face was to mine, and how soft his lips looked in the moonlight, as if all I had to do was lean forward and press mine against his, slowly at first, but then roughly and -

 _Stop it!_ I slipped free of his surprisingly gentle hold and allowed the soles of my worn-out shoes to connect with the wet pavement. The sky boomed above me, looking all parts desolate and ominous. Gray thunder clouds swirled in the night, blocking off the stars. Lowering my inhibitions for once, I snuck Kol a coy glance over my shoulder. "Follow me."

Swift and graceful as a gazelle, I darted forward, light on the balls of my feet. I twirled out of the grim alley into a concrete courtyard surrounded by buildings and trees and wonder. During the day, it was like to be crowded and swarming with crowds and people, but now, only the loneliest souls remained.

A thick, heavy droplet of water splattered onto my nose and a sheet of rain followed soon after, bouncing off the filthy ground in individual explosions. Kol stood beneath the overhang, disgruntled at the sudden change in weather. "I _said_ follow me," I ordered playfully, throwing my arms out to each side and allowing the sky to douse me. Scowling, he stepped out into the pouring rain, his brown hair plastering to his forehead.

I decided to sing an old English folk song, from what I learned to be the sixteenth century, written by no other than King Henry VIII. Dancing out into the middle of the courtyard, I hastily brushed my soaked curls free of my face and began to sing.

"Alas, my love, you do me wrong,

To cast me off discourteously.

For I have loved you well and long,

Delighting in your company."

The familiar joy of music coursed through me, thrumming in my veins, making me feel _alive_. Kol laughed openly and unabashedly at my choice in song, the chiseled contours of his muscles defined beneath his wet shirt. His dark, careful eyes followed me closely.

"Greensleeves was all my joy

Greensleeves was my delight,

Greensleeves was my heart of gold,

And who but my lady greensleeves."

The rain trickled down my face as I sang. My dress clung to my skin and my hair to my head and neck, yet I'd never felt such freedom. It was as if I were a nothing but an innocent child, untouched by the world, shrouded with glee and nakedness as I raced through a meadow of flowers and dreams.

I was young and I was _free._

"Alas, my love, that you should own

A heart of wanton vanity,

So I must meditate alone

Upon your insincerity.

Your vows you've broken, like my heart,

Oh, why did you so enrapture me?

Now I remain in a world apart

But my heart remains in captivity."

And it did not escape my notice how Kol looked at me with such fervent concentration, as if he'd finally found what he'd been searching for.

* * *

 **Kol's Perspective**

She was beautiful as she sang. Undeniably, indisputably, incomparably beautiful. Her milky skin glowed ghostly bright in the weak moonlight, her hair alone an unquenchable torch to lead them through the night. The rain did not bother her; it _strengthened_ her.

Her dress was wet and tight and hugged her curves in all the right places, but for once, that was not what Kol watched. It was her eyes. Her shadowed, vibrant jewels of eyes, glimmering sapphire against the grayness of the night. They displayed every emotion that ranged through her, from anger to pleasure, from sadness to thrill, from grief to hope - all illustrated in those endless blue oceans, in a bizarre form of ecstatic beauty.

"If you intend thus to disdain,

It does the more enrapture me,

And even so, I still remain

A lover in captivity.

I have been ready at your hand,

To grant whatever you would crave,

I have both wagered live and land,

Your love and good-will for to have."

It was perhaps her voice most of all that showed Kol what true beauty was. Any girl could have a flattering form, or a pretty face, or startling eyes, but what broke free of Ella's chest was nothing short of extraordinary.

"Thou couldst desire no earthly thing,

But still thou hadst it readily.

Thy music still to play and sing;

And yet thou wouldst not love me.

I bought thee kerchiefs for thy head,

That were wrought fine and gallantly;

I kept thee at both board and beg,

Which cost my purse well-favorably."

Her luminous voice did the centuries-old song more than enough justice. It rang out into the empty night, a precarious balance between cold and warm, and Kol could not understand how that was. It was like a bell on a windless day, where one could feel the vibrations beneath his or her feet as the city itself ached in response.

Her raw voice pierced through Kol's endless walls and guards and protections, as much as he tried to ward off the foreign spirit. It stirred awake a part of him, deep inside of his chest, that had been dead for centuries, cloaked in rot and darkness. And, eagerly, selfishly, he hoped beyond hope that her voice would never lose its capability to unsettle him so. To make him feel something.

"I bought thee petticoats of the best,

The cloth so fine as it might be;

I gave thee jewels for thy chest,

And all this cost I spent on thee.

Thy smock of silk, both fair and white,

With gold embroidered gorgeously;

Thy petticoat of sendal right,

And these I bought gladly."

Kol decided then and there that he wanted her. He _had_ to have her, and nobody else could lay a finger on her. And he wouldn't rest, not day or night, until he had that young, tortured, extraordinary red-haired singer in his clutches.

She would be his.

* * *

 **Ella's Perspective**

"My men were clothed all in green,

And they did ever wait on thee;

All this gallant to be seen,

And yet thou wouldst not love me.

They set thee up, they took thee down,

They served thee with humility;

Thy foot might not once touch the ground,

And yet thou wouldst not love me."

I did not understand the sort of love the tune spoke of, for I had never once felt it. I'd allowed my body to be used, abused, and tossed to the side like a piece of meaningless garbage. My age never made a difference, either. That had never exactly evoked warm feelings from me. Some would award me with small trinkets along with their dutiful fare after they fucked me bloody. I burned them all.

And the way the man spoke in the song, as if he deserved her love merely because he sought for it. Because he showered her with gifts and favors and fineries, as if she were a trophy to be won.

He probably never knew her at all. She had to have been beautiful, no doubt, but did he care for her beyond that? And if the song truly was about Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, then not long after he birthed his daughter, he had her head removed.

He never loved her, and yet, he felt entitled to her affections. For four years now, ever since my step-father first entered my life and beyond, I'd been surrounded by men who felt entitled towards me - they felt entitled to take my body.

And I hated it. God, I _hated_ it.

Kol wasn't like that. He _rejected_ me, refused my body. Sure, he was a right prick about it, and yet . . . that was the best thing a man had ever done for me in years. How fucked up was that?

"Tis, I will pray to God on high,

That thou my constancy mayst see,

And that yet once before I die,

Thou wilt vouchsafe to love me.

Ah, Greensleeves, now farewell, adieu,

To God I pray to prosper thee,

For I am still thy lover true,

Come once again and love me."

In a moment of simultaneous weakness and strength, I stepped towards Kol, who hadn't pried his eyes from me for more than a second. As the music mingled with my blood, powering my heart and my soul, I grabbed his hands and entangled my fingers with his. It was so strange; I sold my body for a living, and had Kol's naked manhood pressed against me in a bathtub not hours before, and yet, this touch felt more intimate than anything I'd ever experienced.

Staring deep into his dark, enigmatic eyes, I finished off the last verse.

"Greensleeves was all my joy

Greensleeves was my delight,

Greensleeves was my heart of gold,

And who but my lady greensleeves."

As the raindrops pattered around us relentlessly, I beamed more widely than I had in years. Perhaps for only a moment or two, but the weight on my shoulders turned into thin air, and my heart soared as light as a feather.

Kol's eyes smoldering brown fire, he leaned in, stooping slightly due to our significant height difference. Heat rushed to my center in anticipation, and as he pressed his lips ever so softly to mine, my eyelids fluttered shut.

And for the first time in my life, I willingly kissed him back.

 **A/N: Ahhhhhhh feels ahhhhhhhh! I hope you had as much fun reading that as I had writing it. Let me know what you thought! As you know, I looooove feedback. :D See you next time!**


	5. Kindred Spirits

**A/N: I'm baaaack. First off, I'd like to issue a hearty thanks to everyone who has read, favorited, followed, and reviewed this story! It means more to me than I can tell, and I treasure each one.**

 **There's not a lot of _action_ this chapter, but it has all three character perspectives (yay!) and a conversation between Kol and Ella that very much needed to happen to kickstart their romance. Anyway, without much further ado, please read, review, and enjoy! Thanks so much :). **

**Chapter 5: Kindred Spirits**

 **Kol's Perspective**

"Do you do this often?" Smiling mischievously, Ella tugged Kol through countless alleyways in her sudden bout of excitement and energy. Truly, considering his vampire strength and grit, he wouldn't have budged an inch if he didn't want to, but . . . he wanted to. "Stand in the pouring rain and listen to lonely prostitutes sing?"

Kol snorted at her cynical choice of words. It pleased him. "There's a first for everything. Why? Do you often sing to psychotic bloodthirsty maniacs?"

She laughed, the bell-like sound echoing through layers of concrete and grime. He found himself appreciating the sound of her laugh. He wanted to hear it again. He liked to be the one to bring it out of her. "There's a _second_ for everything, technically - if we want to count last night."

Dramatically, he put a hand to his chest and feigned a gasp. "Miss . . ."

"Dubois," she supplied readily.

"Miss _Dubois_ , I never! Last night, you were singing for _me_? And to think, I pegged you as a strong, independent girl - singing for _yourself_. So, here in the pouring rain, I stand corrected -"

"I was singing for Claire," she interrupted, still a twinkle of mirth in her bright azure eyes. "And myself, I suppose."

Kol tilted his head to the side, fighting for comprehension. "Why do you always come second? What about your life stripped you of every inch of self-worth?" Sure, it was a bit _blunt_ of him to put it like that, but truth often uncovered more truths.

A muscle in her jaw twitched, and she stared hard at the stone wall in front of them. So much for her laughter. "I believe I told you, non? Three years of _selling my body and soul_ would do the trick, one would think."

Kol was shaking his head before she even had the chance to finish. "No, that's not it. Well, I'm sure it _helps_ , but there was something else, wasn't there? Something before all of that." Her spine stiffened and she stood up straighter than before, keying him into the fact that he hit a nerve. "Am I correct, darling?"

Ella gnawed so hard on her lip he was surprised blood didn't trickle down her chin. "You're obviously set in your belief. I needn't say anything, it won't change your mind."

His interest sharpened. "You're avoiding my question."

Ella breathed out a sharp sigh. "I'll tell you one day, Kol. Not today, and not tomorrow. But one day." With that, she began to stalk down the alley, not waiting for him to catch up. He saw that she was angry, yes, but more _tired_ than anything. Not physically tired, either - tired of life and everything in it. He understood the feeling, although he prided himself in his fervent habit of living life to its fullest.

A startled shriek escaped the red-haired singer, breaking Kol free of his reverie, and he sped over to her in a fraction of a second. He rolled his eyes once he realized what spurred such a reaction from her. "Oh, poor thing," she crooned, lowering to her knees, ignoring the filth and mud beneath her. She shifted garbage away to reveal a tiny, soaked, mewling kitten.

"Let me get this straight." Annoyed, she glared up at him while still hovering a hand over the trembling little cat. "You couldn't care less about the ails of people around you, but the second you run into an animal, all bets are off. How does that work?"

Ella scoffed, but the corners of her lips still pulled up. "Simple. Animals are better than people." Cooing once more, she removed the kitten from its mangled nest, and it cried pathetically in response. "Hush, you are safe now."

Dirt was caked all over its fur, making him unable to tell what it truly looked like, but he could see it was very young and female. Ella cradled the animal to her chest and continued to coo at it. "You are not keeping the cat," he warned, and she snuck another glower at him.

"Watch me," she bit back, standing up with the kitten still in her hold. "I am not leaving her out here to die." Her hips rocking back and forth with the movement, she began to stalk down the alley, before sneaking a mischievous glance over her shoulder. "Aren't you coming?"

Bloody hell, she would be the death of him.

* * *

 **Claire's Perspective**

The sound of harsh, childish laughter invaded my dreams as little hands from all sides pinned me down. A horrid smell trickled into my nostrils, crackling above me - _fire_. The children lowered the fire on top of me, and it touched me - at first, tentatively, then hungrily - and licked up and down my vulnerable form.

And then it reached my face, and I screamed as it melted off.

I woke in a panic, screeching my lungs out. "Ella?" I whimpered, reaching for the pillow beside me. "Ella, j'ai besoin de toi." * _Ella, I need you._ * Ella was not in the bed. Frantically, I pawed through the sheets, tears involuntarily springing to my eyes. They were empty. I cursed my blindness for the millionth time.

I did not realize where the mattress abruptly ended before collapsing onto the hardwood floor with a groan. "Ella," I whimpered, unable to find the temporary walking stick Kol gifted me with. I crawled to where I _thought_ the doorway was, banging my head against the wall instead, crying out in frustration.

It was easy for Ella to move to new places. It was easy for her to relocate from France to England, but not for me. I hadn't even been completely blind then. That had happened two years after. Now, when I didn't have time to adapt to my surroundings, I was _helpless_ , and I hated that feeling.

I finally found the doorway and crawled out into the hallway. "Ella?" I croaked, listening closely for any sound that might give her away. ". . . Monsieur Kol?"

Nothing. Perhaps they were on the first floor. Far too soon, I reached the staircase, my knees slipping out from under me as I tumbled head-first down the wooden steps. It occurred to me that this could very well be my death, and I shrieked, in case Ella or Kol decided to appear.

They did not, but I didn't die either, which I supposed was a good thing in the long run, no matter how miserable I felt. My body ached and something sticky welled up inside of my nostrils, dripping down my lips and chin. _Blood_. "Ella," I whined, shuffling forward once more. "Come back."

Fat tears rolled down my cheeks. What if she was dead, and I was alone? I was _already_ alone for good portions of the day, since she had to make money and buy food. If there was one thing I hated more than being helpless, it was being alone. It scared me out of my wits. "Ella!" I sobbed, muttering nonsense in French as I groped around for any sign of her. "Come back, I'm afraid!"

Most children were afraid of the dark, but I _lived_ in the dark. I was afraid of silence, and what lurked inside of that silence. Because if I couldn't hear, or if I couldn't touch, or smell, or taste, then I had nothing left.

It took a few minutes, but I finally found the front door, prying it open. It was raining hard outside, the droplets pounding onto the ground like individual little gunshots. "Ella?" I shouted out into the raging storm. "Ella!"

Without thinking it through, I stepped outside, the rain immediately soaking me through and through. My now-short hair stuck to my head, and my wet dress clung to my frail, skinny form. "Ella, Monsieur Kol! Are you there? If you are, please, _s'il te plaît_ , say something!"

The tears mingled with the rain on my face and I stood there as it poured buckets, terrified out of my mind. Finally, my ears sharpened as a distant cry drifted over to me. "Claire!" It was faint, but I wasn't imagining it. It was Ella. " _Claire_?!"

Something rock hard jolted into me, pushing me back indoors, and I only realized it was Monsieur Kol when he all but shouted, "What were you _doing_ , you little idiot? Were you _trying_ to catch pneumonia?" He tilted my head back roughly by the scalp. "Your nose is bleeding. Why?" There was a _crunching_ sound, and he pushed his wrist against my mouth, blood dripping down my throat. My nose healed instantly.

I scrambled free of his grip when Ella entered the home, dissolving into pitiful sobs. "Petite soeur," she murmured, winding her arms around me in a body-crushing embrace. I didn't mind, I squeezed her back just as hard, weeping violently into her front. "I am so sorry. Je suis vraiment désolé." * _I am so sorry._ *

"Tu as quitté," I cried into the drenched fabric of her dress. _*You left_.* "I was being burned in my dream and I woke up and you were gone and I can't see and -" Hysteria forced its wild way into my lungs, and my breaths were rapid and uneven. "It was so quiet."

Ella shifted as if to hand something away, then lifted me up into her arms, where I proceeded to wrap my skinny arms around her neck and my legs around her waist. "I forgot you were blind," Kol said from somewhere behind me in a conversational tone as he rummaged through his kitchen for something. "What'll calm down the little human, Ella? Alcohol? We could pour some ale down her throat and that'll do the trick. Champagne, maybe, for your French culture?"

Ella tensed against me. "Ha ha, Monsieur Kol, you are a comedic gift to us all."

He groaned, and it sounded closer this time, his floorboards creaking beneath his footsteps. "For the _last bloody time_ , I'm not _Monsieur Kol_. I'm Kol. Honestly, woman, it's three letters - not easy to mess up, is it?"

Smiling as well as I could, I turned my ears in his direction. "But that's your name," Ella and I said at the same time, and giggled at the aftermath.

"So, is that how it's going to be?" Despite his so-called offense, there was an obvious note of humor in his tone. "You are going to gang up on me? Team up on me, since there's two of you and only one of me?"

"Oooh, Monsieur Kol," Ella crooned mockingly. "Poor baby. How will you handle yourself? I can't imagine the struggle you - a rich, powerful, handsome, white man - face every day surviving in such a _big, bad_ world." She was laying on the sarcasm thick. It pleased me. Normally, she was too tired and worn-out to joke around. "I cannot even begin to imagine what you go through."

Kol groaned again, and a soft _thud_ sounded, as if he'd dramatically thrown himself onto his couch. "I've survived nine hundred years, I'll have you know, and it hasn't been easy. Sure, I'm stronger than everyone else, and faster, and _better_ \- but it's been hard," he finished with a whine. Then he added, "Wait a damn second. Did you say I was handsome?"

"I said nothing of the sort."

"Yes, you bloody well did!" They continued to bicker back and forth. Something changed between the two of them. Before, they'd barely been talking at all, and now . . . ? It was as if they'd known each other their entire lives.

* * *

 **Ella's Perspective**

I arched an eyebrow at the enormously tall wine glass Kol handed to me from where I sat on his couch, Claire snugged against my side, dozing off. "I didn't take you for a wine drinker."

Claire had calmed down after the first fifteen minutes or so. I should've anticipated her anxiety. Silence was her greatest fear - well, what resided _in_ the silence. She didn't scare for no reason. It was difficult to remember a time when she _wasn't_ blind, but she had sight longer than she hadn't, and she hadn't quite adjusted yet. It would take time.

Using a basin of water, I had scrubbed my rescued kitten clean of any and all filth. Beneath the layers of mud, her fur was a soft white with splatters of orange and black - a calico pattern. Even though Kol had never officially given his permission, he said nothing as the little creature slumbered near Claire.

It confirmed my belief that Kol was . . . different from the other men circulating in and out of my life. And I needed that. I couldn't take any more of the same.

Snapping me back to the present, Kol didn't waste any time before guzzling down his own glass. "Alcohol is alcohol, darling. And that's no typical wine, let me tell you. Taste it." Lifting it to my nostrils, I took a quick whiff. It smelled . . . sweeter than I was used to. "I didn't say _smell_ it, I said _taste_ it."

I raised it to my lips, and after testing it with the tip of my tongue, I drank eagerly. It tasted wonderful, different from any wine I'd ever had before. It tasted like . . . summertime. Kol smirked at me over the rim of his own glass. "I told you. It's straight from the wineries of Spain. It's been in my cupboards for ages. I only drink wine on special occasions."

"And this is a special occasion?" Despite my befuddlement, I wouldn't complain. This was some damn good wine.

"Well, it's your first night here," he replied, pouring himself some more. A waterfall of cherry red splashed into his glass. It was soothing, somehow. "Might as well celebrate." He offered up the bottle, and I held out my own glass, accepting more.

"First?" I challenged, hiding my smile with another deep swallow of wine.

Kol shrugged, making the movement aloof to capture his supposed indifference, but I saw right through it. "Would you prefer I banish you and your petite soeur to the streets? Besides, you aren't terrible company."

He was lonely. He was lonely, and he wouldn't dare say it aloud, but it was the raw truth of it all. Leaning back against the soft cushions, shock filtered through my system at the lack of _pain_. My body had been in a constant aching state since the early afternoon in which my client had beaten me bloody. But it was _gone_ now, as if had never existed in the first place.

Kol had a knowing glint in his chocolate brown eyes. "It's a special sort of wine," he remarked. "I only put enough of my blood in to heal you. I didn't want to ruin the taste."

"There's no pain," I whispered, relief setting deep inside me, right into my very bones. "It's gone. It's all gone. _Merci_." * _Thank you_.*

A shadow flickered across his handsome face. "Mmm, well, it should have never been there in the first place."

"This is my job, Kol," I reminded him, not unkindly. "Clients are allowed to use me as they wish to."

His grip tightened around his wine glass, and I was only thankful he'd finished it off as a series of splinters etched through it. " _Was_ your job," he corrected tensely. "It is no longer."

Kol did not strike me as the benevolent type. Allowing Claire and I to stay in his home, without any source of income? That was beyond me. Everybody wanted _something_ for themselves. There was no truly selfless act. "I do not understand you," I eventually said, choosing a path of neutrality. He gestured a hand for me to continue, listening. "You do not want sex from me. You do not want money. You only want me to sing to you. That's it?"

"That's it," he agreed, tossing his glass carelessly to the side. "Oh relax, I'll pick that up in the morning," he assured once I recoiled slightly at his motion. He then grabbed the bottle by the neck and drank straight from it, gulping it down noisily. After downing about a third of the wine's contents, he set it back on the short, sleek wooden table beside his armchair. "Ah, that hits the spot."

Still, I was flummoxed by his stance on the matter. "So, you _definitely_ don't want to have sex with me," I reiterated, wanting to make absolute sure.

Kol smirked again. "Honestly, you're so stuck on that. Are you used to being the most desirable thing in the room? A bit vain of you, don't you think, darling?"

A wave of ice washed over me and I regarded him evenly. His apparent ignorance wasn't his fault, I supposed. He truly did not understand. "Men do not desire my company in the way you do, Kol. They do not want to hear me speak. They do not care for my opinions, nor my aspirations. To them, I'm a pretty face with a tight, wet hole they like to stick their cocks into when their wives aren't looking. That is all I've been for years. So, s'il te plaît **,** forgive me for my doubts."

This time, to his credit, any traces of mirth disappeared from Kol's now stormy countenance. "I do not view you as a walking cock-holster, if that makes you feel any better," he replied stiffly.

I smiled at him, wry. "You certainly know the way to a girl's heart." Snorting softly, he took another swig of the bottle. "I've known you the better portion of a day, and we've kissed once. Am I supposed to believe that means anything to you? Someone who has lived countless lifetimes?" His lips flattened into a thin line. "I am a lot of things, Kol. I am a whore. I am a liar. I am a thief. But I am no fool," I finished strongly.

His eyes blazed brown fire. "And nor am I. You're right, I've seen centuries pass by. I've seen more than you could even begin to comprehend, seen more than your wildest imaginations can stretch around. In all my years, I find that humans are not unique. It is a rarity to find a girl not closely resembling a type I'd seen and probably fucked or killed before. Or both."

At least he was being honest. I brushed off his crude wording, and sipped at my wine. "Then I am confident when I say I'm no different from anyone else."

Kol slapped his palms onto his knees, making me jump slightly before inwardly berating myself for showing any sort of weakness around him. "That's just it, darling. You're unique _because_ of that. Every human I've come across believes they're special in some way or manner. That they're not like the others. Yet they're all the same. The fact that you think you're _not_ special sets you apart."

I drew in a deep breath of consideration. "So, I'm unique because I believe I'm not?" The corners of his lips pulled up into a genuine smile, and I couldn't help but return it. "So, that, along with my singing, has convinced you to keep me around."

He tilted his head back thoughtfully. "Is that so difficult to believe?"

Stubbornly, and hating myself for it, my ten-meter thick walls refused to allow his compliments pierce through. He couldn't mean it. He _couldn't_. "You probably tell that to every girl you come across."

Kol scoffed, flicking his eyes upward to the ceiling. "You're so damn suspicious."

He had a serious point, but . . . "It's kept me alive thus far."

Kol took a long moment to absorb that. "Fair enough. You're a survivor. I like that." As derision began to harden my features, he hurried along, "You're worried you're not the first girl I've said this to. Well, I'm not here drinking one of my oldest bottles of wine with them, am I? I'm here with you."

How could I get him to comprehend my fears? To accept them? "But _why_?" I stressed, clasping my hands together. "You could be with anybody else. I'm a sixteen-year-old prostitute filled to the brim with self-loathing and cursed with a nonexistent self-esteem. Why are you here with _me_?"

Kol seemed amused by my rambling. "I'm not looking for someone perfect."

I immediately clamped down on that, claws out. "So you admit you're looking for someone."

He exhaled hard through his nose. "I'm also not looking for someone who puts words in my mouth." Leaning back, I clasped my hands together, waiting for a more suitable explanation. It didn't take long. One thing I'd learned about Kol is that he adored the sound of his own voice. "Darling, would you believe me if I told you that I truly have no explanation? That perhaps, I don't want one just yet? Right now, I'm perfectly content with allowing my impulses to lead the way. They've never failed me thus far."

Oh, why wasn't I drunk yet? Setting the glass aside, I reached for the bottle and let the cool, tart liquid gush down my throat. A mild buzz overtook me then, and satisfied, I returned the bottle to its rightful owner. He didn't seem to mind. Eventually, he continued, "Would you believe that I've never been in a romantic relationship? That I've never courted anyone? Lust is different. I seduce women, and I discard them. I take what I want, when I want it, and then I'm on my jolly way."

Somehow, that didn't shock me. Kol was a predator, and a dangerous one at that. He was used to getting what he wanted. "I have never been in a romantic relationship either."

In what was my attempt to form solidarity between us, Kol brushed it aside with an air of black amusement about him. "Darling, you're sixteen, you sell your body for a living, and you're the sole caregiver of your blind little sister. That doesn't surprise me."

"You have such a way with words," I deadpanned. "You should be a poet."

Kol smiled then, but it didn't reach his smoldering eyes. He was serious now. "Would you believe that I want to kill the scoundrels who have been inside you? That I want to rip them apart, until there's nothing human left of them?"

That hit me hard. What was I supposed to say to that? That I would _like_ that? That I would gladly watch as he tore them to shreds? Because I would. It was the truth, and the truth scared me. I should've been disgusted. I should have hated him for even suggesting such an atrocity. But it only served to allure me. "Is that meant to flatter me?" I whispered.

"Perhaps." He shrugged in one fluid, graceful moment. "After all, I do not need an excuse to kill."

Maybe it was the wine talking, or my inner wretchedness. But before I could stop myself, I murmured, "Good. I don't want to be an excuse." Tilting my body ever so forward, I allowed a smirk to tug at my lips. "I want to be a _reason._ "

Kol blinked once, then twice in his honest surprise. But then, dark mischief etched itself across his knowing expression, and he smirked back. "Darling, that's just what I like to hear."

 **A/N: I had a lot of fun writing that conversation. Next chapter, Kol and Ella will stir up some chaos together. What'd you think? Kol and Ella are more alike than they may think.**


	6. The Monster's Dance

**A/N: All right, all right, I suck. It's been two months, and I haven't updated. I'm sorry! It's my junior year, and I'm taking four AP classes. Believe me, I would** ** _much rather_** **write Kol-Ella-Claire interactions all day. I would looooove that. But, alas, I'm doing the best I can and hopefully this longer chapter makes up for it!**

 **This chapter's a bit dark, but, like, so's the story. Still, this chapter is a bit darker than the previous ones. Kol tortures and kills a man with Ella watching, and if that's too much, then don't read the section after the page break. I put my all into it, though. I think it'll be worthwhile. The romance between Kol and Ella darkens but strengthens, if that makes any sense.**

 **Thanks to everyone who has read, followed, favorited, and reviewed! Please read, review, and enjoy. Thanks so much! :D**

 **Chapter 6: The Monster's Dance**

 **Ella's Perspective**

The next morning, it turns out, Kol was entirely serious about maiming my former clients. Not all of them were bad - well, none of them had any qualms about fucking a young girl - but there were a few I wouldn't mind sending to their early graves. For instance, the man only the day before who had pleasured himself while beating me senseless.

Normally, I would worry for his family, but I had on good authority that he was a terrible husband and father. They would be better off without him. In fact, there were rumors in the courtesan world that his wife had taken to sharing her marriage bed with another man. Perhaps she would marry him after her husband was eradicated, and give her children a better father. Perhaps something good would come out of what Kol and I had planned.

I could only hope.

It was almost noon when the poor, random woman Kol compelled to gather us clothes returned. Kol easily slapped a fistful of pounds in her hand, then snatched the bags away, bidding her a hasty leave. I would have chided him for his rudeness, but he didn't _need_ to buy us clothes, and I _was_ thankful for his generosity, so I refrained. After all, it's not like he would stop being rude to people from now on if I mentioned something. He was nine hundred years old. It was surely a habit by now.

Claire was adorable in her little yellow bonnet and matching dress. In her hand rested the stick Kol found for her the day previous, although he promised to acquire her something more official. Meanwhile, I had on a dress of lavender cotton that fell to my shins, which hugged my curves nicely. At least, Kol told me so, in an admittedly cruder way.

Claire had bonded immediately to the kitten, whom I affectionately named Autumn, based on her mottled coloring. Kol was disgruntled about it, but he allowed us to keep her. In fact, he compelled the same woman who found us clothes to buy some milk and other basic supplies for the critter.

"You have a heart of gold," I remarked as he placed the bowl of warmed milk in front of the tiny cat, watching her lap it up with untold eagerness. Grumbling to himself, he shouldered me out of the way as he rose to his feet.

"I do not," he muttered. "I would've thrown the stupid little thing off the rooftop if your sister hadn't liked it so much." He wasn't exactly _disproving_ my point. "Bloody hell." An impish grin then overtook his handsome face. "I can only hope the kitten won't be as high-maintenance as her owner."

Gasping in feigned offense, I smacked him on the side of the head, and he chortled loudly. "You're an ass."

"Ah, ah, ah." He wiggled his forefinger at me. "An ass with a _heart of gold_."

"I hope she pisses on all of your furniture and shreds your drapes."

"That was awfully uncalled for."

Fifteen minutes of concentrated bickering later, Kol, Claire, and I were ready for business. First off, he promised to take us out to a nice restaurant for lunch, and he didn't fail.

I gaped at all the fineries and plates upon plates of food - more than I'd seen in a lifetime. Once we reached a table, Kol pulled out a chair for me and right as I was about to thank him, he slapped me on the ass with a coy wink. Beet red, I elbowed him in the sternum before setting Claire up and sitting down myself. "Kol, there are _people_ _here_ , you putain de connard." _*fucking asshole.*_

"I know," he said with a devious, infectious smile, "I may intend to make them my appetizers."

Much to my chagrin, I wasn't entirely sure of whether he was jesting or not. "Oh relax," he waved me off, "we wouldn't want your petite soeur to witness such brutality."

"I'm blind," Claire reminded him helpfully.

Kol clapped his hands together. "Oh yes, I forgot." He seemed to forget a lot. "Then I see no reason to stop me." I knit my eyebrows together and shook my head. "Fine, fine. Maybe later. I wouldn't want to ruin your appetite."

A waiter appeared out of nowhere, and I blinked, startled. "Mr. Mikaelson," he greeted courteously, with a posh accent I was dying to imitate. As a native French girl, I could never get over the British's funny accents. "It's a pleasure to welcome you here again." His sunken gray eyes appraised Claire and I without any particular interest, although he did a double take when he noticed her milky eyes and his gaze carried a trifle more disdain when it rested on me. Heat flooded my cheeks. It was not a stretch to deduce what he assumed I was, and even more confronting that his quick assumption was, more likely than not, correct.

Kol noticed too. For someone so brash and unconcerned with the feelings of others, he was remarkably perceptive. "It is," he replied, decidedly cooler than when he'd spoken earlier with me. "I wanted to show these two delightful young ladies what proper cuisine is."

A flicker of honest contempt moved across the waiter's wrinkled features. "Mm, yes, _ladies_ ," he said, and I burned from embarrassment. The rest of the customers in the restaurant were of a significantly higher social strata than me. It was painfully obvious that I didn't belong.

From the surface, the thin smile that touched Kol's lips was of polite humor, as if acknowledging a joke though not partaking in the contributor's amusement, but I saw the sinisterness lurking beneath. "Yes, ladies," he retorted, the same cold little grin never slipping from his face. "Those are what we tend to call those of the softer sex. I trust you know that. You work here, after all," he flourished a lazy hand at the marvelous interior, "so you must have some sort of reasonable education, although it's not difficult to serve those who are superior."

I stifled a laugh into my folded hands as the waiter visibly restrained his anger. "Yes, indeed," the man coughed, his cheeks reddening. "Forgive me. The special today is grilled halibut." And with that, the old man left as quickly as he came.

Claire dissolved into childish giggles, making Kol's smile warm into something genuine. "You didn't have to do that," I reminded him, but even I couldn't suppress my own happiness. "But I appreciate it nonetheless."

He inclined his head. "I took you here to show you what it means to have class, not for it to be impressed upon you that, in the eyes of most, you're lacking it." Fondly turning to Claire, who still shook with her sudden mirth, he brushed the back of his fingers against her cheek for the briefest moment. A wave of something unfamiliar washed over me, but whatever it was, I liked it.

"Here, darling." He reached for her wrists. "Your dinner fork is on your left," he moved her hand to rest on top of it, "and your soup spoon is to the right." I melted into a puddle of goo as he continued to direct her hands to each part of the table, patiently explaining what each item was meant for and where exactly to reach it. My heart was swollen with affection as she eagerly absorbed his instruction. Despite his self-proclaimed flaws, he was good with her.

"I'm going to eat all my food so I grow big and strong," she said importantly.

"Big and strong as a grizzly bear?" he chuckled. "Your very own sort of bear. The elusive _Claire-Bear._ " At the spark of pride that came from him in the aftermath of his rhyme, I snorted. God, he was too much, and yet, somehow, just right.

…

My heart pounded in my chest as I knocked on the door. I hadn't imagined standing outside the mansion of the man who beat me bloody the _very next day_ , but it was all part of the plan. Kol had scoped it out and we waited until all inhabitants were gone but him, at some luncheon or another. He and Claire were waiting in the gardens.

The plan was simple. The man, evidently, had appreciated his time with me and requested my presence once more through mutual contacts. Claire would be stationed in the gardens, away from the thick of the action but close enough that Kol could listen for her. I would string along the man until I tricked him into inviting Kol the vampire inside, which apparently, was not a myth. Then, it would get violent.

The front door swung wide open, and the sight of the ugly, grizzled man sent a shiver of fear down my spine. "You again. I was expecting you." His whiskers turned up as he looked me up and down. "You were the best I had in a long while, girl. It makes me hard," he adjusted the waistline of his trousers, "to think about it."

Coolly, I managed to keep my eyes on his face, and only his face. "Then I succeeded in my job, _monsieur_." Where was Kol? I didn't know if I could handle this all on my own, not after what he did to me. What was I supposed to do, pretend I liked it? Pretended I liked being abused, degraded, and defiled?

He took a step backwards, brandishing a welcoming arm. "Won't you come in?" A strange buzz overtook my hands, and my blood turned cold. No, I couldn't do this. No. He was going to hurt me again, and I wouldn't be able to take it. Not this time. I would rather hang myself. I would rather slice into my wrists and bleed out in exquisite, hopeless agony, cutting my life abruptly short, than be hurt like that again. Hurt, and _humiliated_. No, not again.

I opened and closed my mouth, wordless and soundless. I considered turning around and fleeing, saving myself from further angst. Why did I ever think this was a good idea? I didn't care if it was cowardly. I couldn't do this alone, coward or not.

The man reached out for me, and I flinched away. "Well?" he prompted, impatient and aroused. I froze. All I wanted to do was run and and run and envelop Claire in my arms, drink in the comfort she provided, to leave wretched London and return to France, to Paris, and live quietly and peacefully for the rest of my days, oh yes, that's all I wanted . . .

Fate had another plan for me.

"Care for more company?" My eyelids drooped in absolute, unadulterated relief as Kol's voice pierced the tense atmosphere. He was here. I wasn't alone. _He was here_. "Oh, don't look at me like that, good sir." His fingers brushed against my shoulders, and I leaned into his touch, the potent fear I'd felt not moments before draining away into nothingness. My strength returned full-force. "This here is my darling wife." He trailed his lips against my neck in the ghost of a kiss. "She's quite the peach, isn't she?"

I opened my eyes, only to observe the man's face darken from white to red to purple. "I don't know for what man you take me as, sir, but I never -"

"I know what you did," Kol said calmly, his hands never leaving my shoulders, something I was inexplicably grateful for. "Do not do me the dishonor of lying to me." The other man fell silent, wide-eyed and afraid.

"I'm a strange man with strange interests, my good man," Kol continued, clearly enjoying this. "I like watching my wife with other men. Don't I, darling?" I glanced back into his smoldering brown eyes, beginning to understand his peculiar angle. "Call me something of a cuckold, if you will. But this girl," his hands snaked down my sides, cradling every curve, until they rested on my hips and squeezed, while I fought the urge to slap his hands away, "is more than open to sharing, aren't you, love? After all," his grin turned razor-sharp, "she has more than enough holes to go around."

I had to suppress the even greater urge to stomp on his foot.

Kol didn't even need to use his mind control on the man to be invited in, which demonstrated the latter's idiocy and shamelessness. The man was all but salivating. "Quite a lovely home you have," Kol remarked as he strolled inside, arm and arm with me, the man hardly able to hold his jitters of excitement. "I imagine you bring a lot of girls home here."

"None quite as pretty as yours," the man replied eagerly, as if that would endear him to Kol in any fashion. Kol, meanwhile, fingered a lock of my red hair, making a show of admiring my so-called beauty. "So, where do you want to do this?"

"What's your name?" Kol asked, absentminded, as he twirled my tresses around his hand. He was feigning indifference, I could tell, but his act was so believable that even I almost fell for it. "I would like to know the name of the man who _fucked_ my wife." The sharp, clear way he enunciated "fucked" with his eyes never leaving mine sent a new, foreign tingling sensation through me. My breathing grew more labored as I held his darkening gaze.

"Charles," was all the man said, breaking me from my trance. He was beginning to grow impatient. "Shall I show you to my bedroom? Your wife knows where it is. Lead the way, sweetheart," he coaxed, and reluctantly, I stepped forward only for his palm to connect suddenly with my ass. I cringed at the blooming sting, remembering his proclivity to smack me around. "She likes that," he informed Kol.

I chanced a peek over my shoulder, and didn't miss the expansive, frightening blackness that crossed Kol's face. "Indeed," he murmured. "This one likes a lot of things. I cannot wait," something carnal and damn near rabid flickered in his chocolate eyes, "to show you."

Charles didn't notice Kol's abrupt change in demeanor. "I can't wait to find out."

The walk up the staircase was long and painful, and more than once I was again caught up in the desire to turn and flee. The multitude of bedrooms on the second floor itched at me, dug underneath my skin. One door was slightly ajar, and inside were dolls of every size and variety scattered about the room. He had children. A family. I didn't know what was worse. That he was betraying them so terribly, or that I planned to take him away from them.

Was I as bad as him? No. _No._ No, he was in his own league. I steeled myself. He deserved this. I wasn't the only girl he abused for his wanton needs. By eliminating him, I was saving future victims. I was doing the right thing. I had to be.

Right?

My palms grew slick with sweat once we reached his bedroom. This was it. The call of justice. Or was it vengeance?

"Get on the bed," Charles ordered. I met Kol's steady gaze, and he nodded almost imperceptibly. _Play along_ , his face seemed to tell me. Biting my lip, I draped myself across the mattress, keeping my expression stony and unresponsive as Charles lifted up an old floorboard and removed his toys. Kol's lips curled up into a malicious smirk at the sight of them. "Take off your dress."

"Well, now, it's no fun to jump right into it," Kol remarked, and Charles looked properly crestfallen in response, as if Kol had popped his balloon or stolen his candy. I internally stewed. _Fucker_. "Let me show you the proper way to earn your pleasure, my good man. Ella is a very special girl."

What in the hell was going through his head - I drew in a strangled breath as Kol, with a deceptive grace, moved onto the bed and positioned his body over mine, chest to chest. I swallowed hard, my throat suddenly dry as a desert. "You touch her gently." He caressed my cheekbone ever so softly with his knuckles, and I trembled. "Deftly." Heat trailed after his fingertips as they grazed down my jawline. "You envelop yourself in her aroma." I shivered as he dragged his nose up my collar bone, the same foreign sensation from before - pleasure, I realized, and _want_ \- blossoming in my center. "Lose yourself in her beauty." My eyelids fluttered shut. "Tease her." His breath tickled against my left ear. "Make her beg for it." His hand lowered down to my thigh, his fingers circling the revealed skin, and an involuntary flush of pleasure charged through me like a bolt of lightning, leaving a swell of warmth between my legs.

Embarrassment reddened my cheeks at the positively devious expression on his face. Oh God, he knew exactly what he was doing to me. He could _smell_ it. Kol brushed his fingers against my underwear in an infuriating, feather-light touch, and my hips bucked upward. "And, when you ever feel inclined to lay a hand on her in any manner that is not intended for pleasure, when the desire for violence creeps up within you, when you simply must find release . . ."

In one swift movement, Kol blurred from the bed and pinned Charles to the wall by his throat. I gasped at the lack of pressure on top of me - a little disappointed. Clearing my throat, I smoothed out my dress over my knees, clenching my knees together. ". . . You take it out on pathetic sons of bitches who beat girls for sport. Like so." Reeling his arm back, smiling softly, Kol loosed a flurry of uppercuts on Charles' vulnerable face, crushing bone and cartilage alike. Glistening blood coated the now moaning, slumped-over man's features. "You'll learn for next time. Oh, wait." His grin sharpened to something predatory. "There won't be a next time." He lowered to the box of sex toys on the floor. "Now, then. Let's play."

I stepped off the bed just in time for Kol to toss the man into the air like a rag doll and for him to land awkwardly in the spot where I'd been not three seconds before. "P-Please," Charles begged, his shattered nose distorting his speech. "Don' - _don'_ huw' meh."

"That's not your call to make, mate." Kol began to rummage through the box. "Ella, darling, what did he use first on you?"

I pointed at the whip. Kol grinned again. "Lovely. A nice start." He snapped out the whip, testing its feel, and the crack set me on edge. I remembered the morning before, kneeling on the bed, naked and vulnerable, feeling the trail of fire and blood on my skin after each crack. _Crack. Crack_. _Crack_. "Where did he hit you first?"

"My backside," I mumbled, quiet with shame, and Kol twirled the whip around in his hands, thoughtful.

"Hmm. Is that so?" I steeled my resolve as Kol struck the man on the ass. Charles howled, pitiful in the comparison of my desperate stoicism. "Like that, darling?"

"I was naked, but close enough. I do not ever want to see him naked again, nor do I particularly want to hear his sniveling." I crossed my arms, icy in the face of Charles' blubbers. "It is giving me hives."

Kol smirked devilishly. "Well, gent, you heard the lady. Keep your clothes on and shut up." With a flick of his wrist, the whip went sailing through the air, and landed in the exact same spot as before. Charles' elbows and knees crumpled beneath him, and he collapsed to the mattress, tearful and murmuring out an incoherent mess of apologies. Kol hadn't a smidgen of mercy for him. The whip met its mark again, and again, and again.

"Where now, Ella?" Kol asked lightly, unruffled and unbothered by the man's boisterous sobs. "Where did he hurt you next?"

"My thighs. Then my back, my shoulders, my stomach, my -" I cut myself off, feeling humiliated all over again.

Evidently, Kol remembered - we had bathed together, after all, and he hadn't been exactly prudish in his look-overs. "Your breasts," he finished for me, and I nodded, staring down at my clasped hands, as if they would hide me from my burning shame. "Hmm. That will be difficult to reproduce, but I'll manage."

I was fervently ambivalent at the repeated _cracks_ of the whip and Charles' wails for mercy. At face value, I did not want another human being to suffer as I did. If it were anyone else . . .

But it was he who caused me such torment. Did he not deserve swift and proper retribution? For I was not the only one; he had exerted his deranged will and inescapable power on many women - and girls, he preferred them young and fresh, so he could be the first to break them - before me. Was I not acting in their best interests? Was I not avenging them?

And then there was that foreign sensation, lingering beneath my skin and traveling lower and lower as Kol continued his torture. It was not the man's suffering which brought me pleasure, although the parallelism brought me an undeniable thrill of satisfaction, but Kol. God above, he was cruel, but he was glorious. His muscles tightened and coiled in his arms and chest as he struck again and again and again. His glimmering, straight white teeth displayed themselves ever so often, whether in a smile or a snarl, but it was his eyes that drew me in.

His eyes blazed brown wildfire, sharpened into weapons capable of tearing one apart with only a cursory glance, alight with a joyous sort of sadism that would have bothered me . . . if it was not on my behalf. He was enjoying himself as he inflicted pain in my name, and I enjoyed myself _watching_ him inflict pain in my name. What kind of person did that make me?

But I had never quite been like the rest of them, had I?

Once Charles had been sufficiently bloodied, Kol tossed the whip to the side. "Then what did he do, darling?" he asked, surveying the writhing man like a painter surveyed his art.

"He gagged me and chained me to the bedposts," I said hoarsely, still waging a war of morality within myself, hating myself as intrigue won over revulsion. It fascinated me. Kol did, and the act of violence itself. Perhaps being beaten down by the world so many times rendered me incapable of compassion. Or perhaps I'd been born with a darkness that had festered and lingered and clawed its way out of me over time.

Perhaps it was both.

Kol plucked the filthy strip of cloth from the box of sex-related items and stuffed it into Charles' mouth, tying it behind his head in quick and agile knots. He beamed once he reached the chains. "Oh, how I love chains. For torture and . . . pleasure alike." He sent a coy wink at me, and my mind exploded with images, each more graphic than the last. Somehow the thought of Kol using them on me didn't seem so bad. No, not in the slightest. In fact, it was quite appealing.

"Next time you want to use them, come knock on my door," I purred, and the look he gave me in return was priceless. Clearly, he was not used to the bawdy remarks of his being returned with equal gusto. It seemed to please him, once he got over his initial surprise.

"Like that, Ella?" he murmured once he finished securing Charles to the bedposts.

"Oui," I drawled. "And, at which point, he started to fuck me. That is an experience I do not wish to repeat here." It was one thing to issue him the beat-down of his lifetime, but forcing something on him of a _sexual_ nature? That was where I drew the line. No matter how horrible they were, nobody deserved that.

"I wasn't planning to," Kol murmured. "I have some standards, after all. I don't hurt children, or rape women - or men. My honor is all but nonexistent, but there's a sliver of it left."

The relief that charged through me at that moment was monumental. Kol wasn't like the rest of them. He was a murderer, certainly, and by all definitions a monster - but he wasn't a rapist, and somehow, that changed things for me. It was illogical and hypocritical and morally reprehensible, but it was the truth. After the hell my step-father put me through . . . I couldn't take it.

"But I have no qualms against killing you," Kol continued cheerfully, sitting down on the edge of the mattress and patting Charles' twitching, bloody, now urine-stained leg. "Or burying you in the backyard under that lovely little lemon tree. How do you feel about that?" Charles whimpered into his gag. To rub salt into the wound, Kol positioned his hand over his ear. "Speak up, I can't hear you. Ella, what is he trying to say?"

"I think he's begging for it," I said, a little taken aback by my own cruelty. But I continued on, "I think he wants you to take his life."

Kol made a show of pretending to be shocked by my response. " _Really_? Is that so?" He patted Charles on the head, smoothing a lock of sweat-laden hair out of his face. "Hmm. If the man wants death, I suppose I can provide that for him."

Charles strained against his restraints, and whimpered again. Kol and I collectively ignored him. My chest jolted and my breath caught as Kol began to wrap the whip around Charles' neck. This was it. He was going to do it. "I want you to feel as suffocated as those girls like Ella did when you tied them to your bed, pinned them to the mattress, and fucked them raw. They were at your mercy. Now you are at _my_ mercy." Kol tightened his grip on the whip and started to pull each end of it taut. "Any last words, Ella, before I end him?"

I could have said something malevolent to send him off. It was tempting. So tempting. It was so damn inviting a thought to have my verbal venom be the last thing he heard before he slipped into the expansive darkness. But, somehow, I couldn't bring myself to do that. Perhaps I wasn't _that_ evil. "Goodbye, Charles."

Kol made quick work of strangling the man to death, and not once did I remove my level gaze. He was doing this because of me. It was my duty to watch. And, a wicked part of me sang, I _wanted_ to watch. I wanted to watch the light leave his eyes. I _wanted_ to watch him die.

Kol then tossed the whip aside, and brushed off his hands, cheerful again. "Well, that was fun. Before I bury the poor sap in the backyard, let's explore, shall we?" Before I could protest - even if I'd wanted to - Kol stalked from the room, whistling.

"Kol!" This was my chance, my chance to place a boundary on my cruelty. To set limits for myself that I would vow never to cross. I could have. I _should_ have. Because it wasn't simply Kol's influence that was igniting such malice inside of me. He was merely kindling a vengeful fire that had already been burning long before he ever met me. He was encouraging my wickedness, but not creating it. This was on me.

And yet, all I said was, "Wait up!"

Hurrying after him, I found Kol peeking through study. Leaning against the doorway, bemused, I observed as he plucked a thin, supple cane from the bottom drawer of the large, cherry desk. It was a sort of implement that only had one purpose and one purpose only - to be used as a weapon for punishment. "I bet he used this on his children," Kol mused, admiring it from different angles. "When he wasn't busy fucking prostitutes, that is." He swished it downward, and it cut through the air with a _whoosh_. "This would be suitable for Claire, would it not?"

My mind froze for a moment, misinterpreting his words. Suitable for Claire? As in, to _use_ on her? Kol wanted us to live with him, yes, but did he plan on disciplining Claire with that? She was a mild-mannered child, but prone to mischief. Did he envision a future where he would need to cane her for her misdemeanors? Because, if so, then I wouldn't stay with him for another night. I would take Claire and leave, and we'd go to France, and -

Kol rolled his eyes, obviously reading the turmoil on my face. "Oh, bloody hell. I didn't mean to _hit her_ , I meant in place of her current walking stick." Oh. _Oh_. My cheeks burned. I felt like an idiot - a paranoid, cynical idiot who was incapable of seeing the good in people. "Honestly, woman. You need to lighten up."

"How was I supposed to know?" I demanded, immediately on the defensive, even when I knew I was in the wrong. "I don't know you, not really. I've known you for the better part of two days. This is - this is all spiraling out of control." Oh, and here were my ethics knocking on the door, a little late to the party. "We kissed once. My petite soeur and I now live with you. I just watched you kill a man. All in the span of two days. Less than that, even! What - what is _happening_?"

Kol arched a single brow. "Are you done?"

I bristled. He was acting as if my fears were entirely unfounded. Hardly. "You know, my worries aren't exactly _unwarranted_ , you ass. This is all happening so quickly."

Kol huffed, and leaned against the polished, reddish desk. "Fine. You're worried this - all of this - is going too fast, yes?" I nodded stiffly. "I'm not keeping you here. You have free will, use it. If you're so worried for your own conscience and safety, then leave with Claire. Nobody's stopping you. Leave, and don't look back." He was annoyed now, that I knew for sure. Maybe even entering angry territory, if his tight jaw had anything to say about it.

His dismissal stung more than I wanted to admit. I didn't want to leave. Oui, everything was happening very quickly, but I didn't necessarily want it to _stop_. My life before had been miserable. I was beaten down and filthy and starving and sold myself multiple times a day. Within two days, Kol had healed me, I was clean, well-fed, and looking forward to a future that didn't involve sex for money. He was offering Claire and me a _home_ \- a permanent, stable _home_. I would be an ungrateful fool to ignore all he had already done for me.

It was so strange. He was a monster, by all intents and purposes - he had just tortured and killed a man, after all, with no remorse - and yet, he'd been kinder to my petite soeur and me than any other _regular_ person had been for years.

Everything felt very tight and hot, as if the walls were closing in on me. "Do you want me to leave?" I croaked. What if he said yes? I hadn't even considered what I would do. Could I return to my previous hell after tasting the good life? No, I didn't think I could. For Claire, I would do anything, but it would destroy the rest of whatever spirit I had left. I'd be dead on the streets by age twenty, and it would be a mercy.

Kol avoided the question. "Do you want to leave?" he countered. He toyed with a stray piece of paper, wrinkling it up and smoothing it out over and over again, and it occurred to me that he was _nervous_. Maybe he didn't want me to leave. Maybe he'd gotten used to our company as I had gotten used to not being treated like absolute shit every other second of the day.

"No, I do not want to leave," I replied. If he was relieved, he did an excellent job of masking it. "I've been happier the last two days than I have been in a long time."

"I suppose the same could be said for me," he said, all nonchalance and indifference, but I saw through it. He was lonely. God, he had to be so _lonely_. Nine hundred years old, and he didn't have a wife or a child or a close family to speak of. He pretended he didn't care about anybody or anything, but it didn't take a genius to see how much his family's neglect ate at him. The lonely, rejected boy who played at being a monster because he would rather be hated for his heinous actions than be hated for his true self. He wanted to _know_ why he was hated, so he made a _reason_ for it. Because if it wasn't his monster façade, and his family, the people who were meant to love him unconditionally, hated him because of _him_ , because of who he was deep down, then he wouldn't be able to continue on, would he?

My legs carrying themselves forward of their own accord, I placed a gentle hand on his shoulder, feeling the tense muscles gradually smooth out beneath my palm. "I do not want to leave you, Kol, and neither does Claire. We want to stay with you."

He met my gaze then, and his brief flicker of intense vulnerability and deep insecurity startled me to the core. There was more to Kol, more than I understood. But I _wanted_ to understand. Both displays of earnest emotion went away as quickly as they came, though, replaced by his trademark bravado and arrogance. "Of course you do. I'm a delight."

I snorted, and the sincerity of the moment was long gone. "Oui, that's it. Keep telling yourself that, mon ami." _*my friend.*_

"I will, because it's the truth. Anyway, I believe we were exploring, were we not?"

Kol's journey of nosiness led us all around the second floor, and finally, we ended up in a little girl's room, the one with toys scattered all around her floor. He kneeled down and reached for a porcelain doll. "Kol," I warned as he tugged at its curly hair. "You just murdered this girl's father. You don't need to mess with her toys."

"Oh, relax." He tossed the doll aside, and picked up another. "She has so many of them. I'm merely browsing my options."

"Browsing your options?" I smirked. He looked ridiculous, examining each doll and stuffed animal up close. "Do you collect children's toys? If I looked in your closet at this very moment, what would I find?"

"It's for Claire, you bint," he retorted, and my smugness faded almost instantly. _Oh_. "She doesn't have any toys. Seems unfortunate. Most little girls do, so . . ." He lowered his chest down to the carpet, and reached underneath her bed. He snatched up a dusty but overall new teddy bear, one that clearly had not been given lots of love or attention in comparison to the rest of the toys. He brushed off its thick brown fur, the dust particles floating away in the weak stream of sunlight. "Here. This will do."

My heart swelling up, I nodded, wordless. What sort of odd monster was he? He murdered people left and right, and yet, he noticed that a tiny little blind girl didn't have any toys, and wanted to give her one. An involuntary wave of tears sprung to my eyes. I hadn't been able to afford any toys for Claire, and nobody had cared that she was a lonely child with no friends and hardly a possession to her name.

But Kol did.

"You don't need to be all emotional about it," he grumbled, rolling his eyes again. He then shoved the toy into my chest, and I caressed the soft, furry fabric. "It's just a damn teddy bear, I didn't cure cancer."

Ignoring his attempts to rile me up, I smiled at him, genuinely smiled. And, ever so slightly, he smiled back.

It didn't take long for Kol to bury Charles underneath the little lemon tree. As he patted down the earth with a shovel, I held Claire in my lap, propping my chin on her temple. She hadn't the faintest clue what was happening, and I wanted to keep it that way. I crooned a melody into her ear, and she leaned back into my chest, content.

We snuck out from the gardens after that, through the back gate, and Kol led us three blocks away before he allowed Claire and me time to catch our breaths. Only then did he kneel down to Claire's level, and give her both the walking cane and teddy bear. "I found these for you, darling," he said, and she curiously reached out for both items, soon dissolving into giddy excitement.

After swinging the cane around like a sword, making both Kol and I laugh at her childish antics, she hugged the teddy bear tightly to her chest, as if she were afraid it would disappear beneath her fingertips. "I'm naming it Monsieur Kol," she chirped, and Kol snorted in response.

I had watched Kol torture and murder a man. For me. All for me. I should have been wrecked, ripping myself to shreds. My morals should have long since kicked in, but they hadn't. Everything good about me was a lie, and I should have been running far, far, _far_ away from Kol. He was a sadist. A monster.

Yet he made Claire smile, and that was all that mattered to me.

 **A/N: So, that was a bit dark, wasn't it? I had to include a little fluff at the end, though, because I'm me. Kol's by all intents and purposes a horrible person, and yet, he gives a misfortunate little girl a teddy bear because he notices she doesn't have any toys. He's a contradictory man, that one.**

 **The next chapter will have something of a time jump. Not too long, maybe a few months, but it'll be there. Stay tuned, and tell me what you think in the comments! :D**


End file.
